Songfacts®:

• This eco-fable was recorded in New York with former Velvet Underground frontman Lou Reed contributing semi-spoken vocals. Gorillaz bass player Murdoc told The Guardian February 27, 2010 that the New York singer tried to ban Gorillaz from the studio. He explained: "He wanted to do his whole vocal thing in private; he ordered everyone out the studio. Me too! I just waited until he was up and running, getting his groove on, then I crawled back in under the mixing desk where he couldn't see. I love Lou, but y'know, this is my album."
• Murdoc said on the Gorillaz's website: "I grew up on Lou Reed, and the Velvets. And I loved Lou's solo stuff, Magic and Loss and The Blue Mask and Transformer of course. It's funny. This track's got a good ol' sunshiny vibe. Like something off Sesame Street. Apparently Lou Reed is one of the only people to never appear, or refuse to appear, on Sesame Street. So it's quite a coup that we got him on this."
• Damon Albarn recalled in the book Isle of Noises by Daniel Rachel: "When we did 'Some Kind Of Nature' for Gorillaz, Lou Reed met me in the morning at the studio. We talked it over. He got in a cab, went uptown, did something, came back downtown, got out of the cab and did the thing. He'd written it in the cab journey up and down: a very Lou Reed, New York thing to do."
• Asked by Rolling Stone how he managed to get the notoriously hard-boiled Lou Reed to appear on this track, Damon Albarn replied:
  
  "I have my ways [laughs maniacally]. I sent him quite a few tunes, and he just said they were all s--t. Finally, I did this tune, and he liked it. I'm the perpetual suitor – but also not taking it too personally when someone turns you down. 'I can do this without you. I'm only asking you because I think it would be cool.' That's my attitude.
  
  I don't get intimidated by famous people. I just look them in the eye and hope they look back. With Lou, we were in the studio. He'd written these lyrics. But he said, 'Don't expect me to follow your verse-chorus thing. I'm just going to sing. And the way it drops is how it is.'
  
  It helps to be very flexible when you're working with people like Lou Reed. But you want that approach. You don't want someone just doing exactly what you want. You want that sense of opposition and independence. That's what it's all about."