Go Back

This is Tony Allen's track "Go Back (feat. Damon Albarn)", not an Albarn-led release. Albarn sings, plays keys and is credited as co-writer. It is track seven of Film of Life and was announced as the lead single on July 2, 2014. Allen's YouTube description, relayed by OkayAfrica, calls it an homage to the African refugees who ended up on the Italian island of Lampedusa, and OkayAfrica called it a supremely meditative horn-flanked ballad. Stereogum's Michael Nelson called it nothing short of beautiful and a languid, easy, sun-drenched thing, and Songlines heard a slow Afrobeat drum pattern under a melancholy vocal melody.

A black-and-white video premiered on the Guardian site on September 10, 2014. A single promotional source says it was written and recorded in Allen's Paris studio in one day, 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Albarn had guested on Allen's 2002 album Home Cooking, their work beginning with "Every Season". He performed "Go Back" at the virtual AIM Independent Music Awards on August 12, 2020, closing the show in tribute to Allen, who was honored posthumously with the Outstanding Contribution to Music award.