Musicovery Series - #2 Massive Attack

And finally I get a chance to get back to this....

Musicovery #2 - February 2010 - Massive Attack

Rock, Pop, Hip-Hop & Trance,they are the four genres of music which have always stolen the lime light where modern day evolution of music is concerned. There is a fifth genre which is looked at only from the perspective of movie, television or gaming music. The long neglected "techno" or "electronica", very few names come to mind fatboyslim, prodigy and chemical brother. The "techno" fan inside of me has made me search quite a few dark corridors of stores,blogs, you tube and imdb to find out techno tracks at times heard in movies, games or trailers. One such search for the theme music from the t.v. show "House M.D" lead me to my second grand find for this year.

"Massive Attack" mounted a massive attack on my senses, they are not a pure band nor are they a pure techno track making studio. I can only describe them as group of talent musicians or djs who have come together to create some intense music. They work with various individual artists to produce stuff that sounds real good. My experiment with them started from the Album "Mezzanine", first being "Angel". "Angel" has a dark undertone to it and the angel word has definitely been used to signify a dark angel or the angel of death probably. The drumming on it is a real piece of work, with the top hat used very effectively, whereas the bass lends a sinister twist to the whole track. Honestly the kind of music you would want to listen to driving to anywhere at midnight or maybe to pump yourself up before a hard day. Next comes "Tear drop", for those who don't know this is the same track that gives you goosebumps when watching House M.D. Where 'Angel' is dark, 'Tear drop' is all about bright, right from the lyrics to the sitar like sound the music inspires and it literally gave me goosebumps. Inertia Creeps, Black Milk & Dissolved girl are the other three track that have become part of my favorite list. Black milk has a very jazz fusion, forlorn, lonely soul or candle light sex sound to it. After listening to this I could make out that Massive Attack is definitely not 100% pure techno and neither they are the kind of music which would have mass appeal however they are a must listen for people who are on the look out for that different sound.

The next two Massive Attack albums I dug into were 100th Window and Heligoland.
Compared to the first album which bordered on techno, these two albums sounded completely different. The nature of their music changed itself with each track, 100th Window featured two track that caught my fancy 'Butterfly Caught' & 'Special Cases'. 'Butterfly Caught' sounds straight out of an Enigma album only with a slight trance touch to it, Robert del naja sounds like the devil himself on this track and almost convinces you to dim your lights just to enhance the whole experience. 'Special Cases' is a track which retains some bit of the sound from Mezzanine, the track might be attributed as outright scary or creepy by some and I wouldn't disagree however it will go well with a glass of wine.

My hunt for other Massive Attack tracks ended with Paradise Circus from their album Heligoland and a single called 'Live with me'. Paradise Circus is a very soothing track and suited for some relaxed listening. As for 'Live with me', the best song to get drunk to. They have definitely come down the curve however Mezzanine and 100th Window are definitely albums worth exploring. I personally recommend the music video for Angel, you'll hate huge lonely parking lots from then on !