Let’s Talk About The Weird Corvette-Related Detail On The Gorillaz’ Geep: Cold Start

I’ve been listening to a lot of Gorillaz recently, because sometimes it’s fun to listen to a real band with sort-of fake members, or however you want to classify whatever the Gorillaz are. More importantly, the band’s first album featured an image (by illustrator Jamie Hewlett) of a fictional car on the cover, a car that’s quite familiar-looking, but with some strange details. I want to look at one of those details now because, like all good details, it’s taillight-related.

The car in question is the one you see up top there, the Geep. For some reason, I assume that’s pronounced with a hard “G,” like “gonad” or “GIF,” at least if you agree that GIF should be pronounced with a hard “G” because the first word is “Graphical,” and not the soft “G” that some weirdos like to use.

Also, I think it’s a hard “G” because a soft “G” would just sound the same way “Jeep” with a “J” is pronounced. Anyway, here’s the detail I want you to see:

The Geep looks a lot like a Meyers Manx, or, perhaps, one of the innumerable Manx knockoff dune buggies, and seems to be built on the same VW Beetle chassis as any Manx. What’s strange is the front lighting, which appears to be taken from the taillights of a Corvette!

Yes, the set of four lamps look like the taillights of a C3 ‘Vette, but with the order flipped, so the round units with the reverse lamps are on the outside, and the all-red ones are on the inside. I’m guessing here the reverse lamp ones are the headlamps, and the red ones are some kind of auxiliary lamps, though that red color would be illegal to have up front, if any of the Gorillaz care about that.

There also appears to be a small amber light atop the right rear fender, though I’m not clear about what it is or its purpose. It can’t be a turn indicator, as it’s alone, and turn indicators tend to travel in pairs.

That light resembles a Mopar-style indicator tell-tale light, just facing the other direction.

But back to the main lights, from the Corvette. These lights are also the only photographic element incorporated into the otherwise hand-drawn illustration of the Geep and its occupants, which is odd, too.

The Geep shows up in the video for the song 19-2000, which reveals other interesting details about the Geep, and shows a different set of front lights:

….these front lights all seem to be pure red, which is weird, but no weirder than the fact that the Geep seems to have an automatic transmission and is capable of launching missiles.

An auto! In a Manx? Oy.

The engine is shown, but it’s hard to make out details or see how accurate it is, though it does clearly have headers.

Other renderings of the Geep seem to vary quite wildly; that one above, also by Hewlett, seems to have a variant of the Corvette lights, though now with deeper chrome bezels.

Also, this vinyl toy version of the Geep has yellowish front headlamps, which now number six, including the four lower ones as seen before, and a pair of hood-mounted headlights that are much more traditionally Manx-like. Also, this one doesn’t have the camo paintjob:

Also, the engine on the toy one seems to be a sort of Briggs and Stratton-type of one-cylinder air-cooled engine, complete with a pull-start!

Fascinating, right? It’s making me cheddar-headed.