Send "Massive Attack " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Sputnikmusic |
 There are a whole lot of thing I don't like about greatest hits albums, but one of the big ones is that they tend to obfuscate the realities of an artist's work. I'm not just talking about all the great album bands who are usually judged based on a tiny collection of arbitrarily chosen singles; I'm talking about all the bands who try to make people forget about a poor album by following it immediately with a Best Of. Yes, Massive Attack, I'm looking right at you.Collected didn't just make people forget about how crushingly disappointing 100th Window was, it made people forget how long it's been since then, too (7 years to the day, for the record). It was cynical and deliberate, and the marketing for Heligoland has been suitably shameless. 'The first album with Daddy G in 10 years!' And how many studio albums have been released in that time? Oh wait, it's only one, isn't it? 'A return to the sound of Mezzanine!' So a return to the sound of one album ago, then. And yet, for all the raised eyebrows and tuts the build-up to Helioland has produced, the most remarkable thing about it is that it instantly blows away the cobwebs. The 7 years have been spent wisely - this is exactly the album Massive needed to make after 100th Windows. The only real disappointment is that it took so long....full text |
| Guardian |
| Just as you can tell a lot about a person by the company he or she keeps, so the scale of a band's ambition can be gauged by their guest vocalists. On paper, then, Massive Attack's first album in seven years should mark a return to their glory days and the unparalleled Protection and Blue Lines. There are contributions from Elbow star Guy Garvey, 3D's old mucker Damon Albarn, Hope Sandoval of 90s dream pop cult act Mazzy Star and, on the opener, Pray For Rain, TV on the Radio's Tunde Adebimpe. Best of all, perhaps, for those who hated 100th Window, a 3D solo album passed off as a Massive set, Daddy G has returned from his "sabbatical", eager no doubt to save 3D from himself and inject a note of something other than despair. Buy it from Buy the CD Massive Attack Heligoland Virgin 2010 And yet, for the first half of Heligoland at least, the Bristolians' fifth proper album is less than the sum of its impressive parts. In a recent preview of the year ahead, one broadsheet journalist described it as "ambitious" and a contender for the Mercury award. Odd, given that unlike Portishead, say, who used their time in exile to reinvent themselves, their fellow West Country act, in 2010, sound as listless as they did seven years ago. As on 100th Window, Mushroom's absence is pronounced, while 3D does little more than mutter to himself – a one-time heavy hitter who's fallen on hard times. "I want to get clean but I've got to get high," he half-raps on Rush Minute, an intriguing opening in dire need of a song. Equally forgettable are Babel and Psyche, both of which are sung by Martina Topley-Bird and, like every record she has made since Maxinquaye, betray her desire to return to the mid-90s when drum'n'bass-flecked woozy soul was quite the latest thing. Then, six songs into a characterless album, one on which ambience takes precedence over tunes, 3D and Daddy G unveil three stunning numbers that compare with anything in their back catalogue. The first, Guy Garvey's Flat of the Blade, evokes the weightless soul-jazz once particular to John Martyn, although the beats are shiny, skew-whiff and modern. "Things I've seen will chase me to the grave," warbles Garvey, the music reflecting his audible unease. It's followed, brilliantly, by Paradise Circus on which Hope Sandoval, both innocent and seductive, whispers her equivalent of Tracey Thorn's Protection over a minimal piano and handclaps. Then, on the mystical Saturday Come Slow, his cracking voice implying he's been up for half the night, Damon Albarn lays bare the vulnerability that his public air of self-confidence conceals. "Do you love me?" he cries over gently plucked strings, once again a pimple-faced, angelic teenager....full text |
| Antiquiet |
| When the Tapeworm project between Trent Reznor, Maynard Keenan and an assorted dream team of contributing musicians was killed for contractual reasons, Reznor made a comment that if the music had been great, they would’ve found a way to release it. The bar is set higher than most others when the leading talent in any field collaborates on a project, and sometimes the end result falls short of vision. Other times, perfect harmony is found and evolution’s hand is forced. In the case of Massive Attack’s long-awaited Heligoland, it seems the latter applies. Serving as both a nod to the defining albums of the genre cluster Massive Attack belongs to and a call to evolution, on the broad stroke Heligoland is at times more under the world music umbrella than trip-hop. 3D and Daddy G have never been known for the easy kill, and after an LP dry spell of nearly seven years, the duo return with a formidable dose of star-studded smoky subtlety and simmering ambient suspense in place of uptempo dance-remix bait and the skittering Eurotrash beats the kneejerking scenesters long for. While pushing down walls of definition, the sound touches on Portishead, veers toward DJ Shadow (damn closely on Atlas Air, which could be Organ Donor’s kid sister), recruits Blur/Gorillaz frontman and pre-emptive 2010 musical VIP Damon Albarn, as well as the inimitably lovely Martina Topley-Bird for a collaborative feast of talent. Co-produced by Neil Davidge (who also played bass) and Tim Goldsworthy, as well as D and G, the checks and balances on consistency and sound dynamics are remarkably lush and seamless, enhanced by the minimalism of the entire work. The deep, rhythmic drum presence on several tracks, particularly lead-in track Pray For Rain, give the most immediate indication of the album’s minimalist power. It’s an interesting opener, given its presence on last year’s Splitting The Atom EP, but its timelessness is undiminished; it’s one of those songs that feels as if it’s been there all along. Like rolling thunder under TV On The Radio’s Tunde Adebimpe’s uncharacteristically ghostly Twilight Zone tenor, the live drums are hypnotically commanding and help raise this track to the ranks of their very best....full text |
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