Donald Glover Is Un-Retiring As Childish Gambino With New Music On The Way

Donald Glover has walked back on the earlier suggestions that he’d retire his alter ego, Childish Gambino, with the promise of new music on the horizon.

“I’m making music right now, I love it,” Donald Glover told E!’s Laverne Cox during his red carpet interview at the 2023 Golden Globes.

“I’m actually working, I’m in the studio. I’ve been bringing people in, like secret people, working on little things. But I just been, you know, making it for fun right now. But soon something will happen, I promise. Something will happen.”

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Glover then clarified his comments about “retiring” Childish Gambino that were “out in the [ether].”

“You don’t have to worry about that… He’ll be back.”

The prospect of retirement as a musician has also been lingering “in the ether” for years now. Back in 2018, the powerhouse multi-hyphenate revealed he was “standing by” his decision to step away from the entire Childish Gambino project.

“I’m making another project right now. But I like endings, I think they’re important to progress,” said Donald Glover, months prior to dropping his Grammy Award-winning political track ‘This Is America,’ which was followed up later that year with ‘Summertime Magic’ and ‘Feels Like Summer.’

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All three tracks were accompanied by a short film distributed by Amazon Studios, Guava Island, in which he co-starred alongside Rihanna and reunited with regular collaborators: brother Stephen Glover (writer) and Hiro Murai (director).

Two short years later in 2020, between his packed touring schedule and burgeoning film + television career, Glover would release his fourth studio album 3.15.20 without any warning or marketing build-up. And we haven’t heard a peep from him on the musical front since.

But now that his masterfully neo-surrealist dramedy Atlanta has concluded its enviable four-season run, it would appear the man has plenty of time for Childish Gambino.