CD review: Massive Attack - Heligoland

Thursday 4th February 2010

Crackerjack rating: 9 / 10.

Massive Attack: Heligoland (Virgin Records)

If 100th Window was all about dense, multi-layered electronica then Massive Attack’s fifth album gets back to basics and strips the songs back to their very essence.

The impressive roll call of guest vocalists looks great on paper and more than delivers in the studio. There are more collaborators on Heligoland than any of Massive’s previous four outings but it’s a testament to the band’s skill that the album retains its coherency and feels totally rounded.

Tunde Adebimpe – he of current critical darlings TV On The Radio – gets us under way with the nigh-on seven-minute epic Pray For Rain. It’s graceful and unhurried, packed with enigmatic lyrics and can stand shoulder to shoulder with the best of Massive’s back catalogue.

While electronic textures still lurk behind much of Heligoland, it’s more welcoming than 100th Window and manages to reveal more and more with each listen.

Former Tricky co-vocalist Martina Topley-Bird makes her Massive Attack debut on Babel – a feisty stew of brittle, hyperactive percussion and whoozy vocals. And Daddy G reappears with sparring partner 3D on Splitting The Atom, it’s all lurching dubbiness propelled by G’s subterranean baritone and D’s menacing whispers. Long-time collaborator Horace Andy also weighs in with a chorus.

But Andy’s main contribution on Heligoland comes with Girl I Love You – a reworked version of 16 Seeter from the band’s last tour. Andy’s sweet vocals cut through the eerie backing track which builds to a quite gorgeous off-kilter brass section crescendo.

And then, a little palette cleanser. Topley-Bird returns with the pastoral Psyche, a featherlight and melodic track with warm acoustic guitar textures.

The record’s most experimental moment arrives courtesy of a hook-up with Elbow’s Guy Garvey. Not a song in the traditional sense of the word, Garvey’s disembodied vocals are stretched, warped and processed over other-worldly electronica textures.

Paradise Circus is another down-tempo gem that could punch its weight with the likes of Protection and Teardrop. Former Mazzy Star frontwoman Hope Sandoval purrs seductively over the delicate keyboard refrain, handclaps and ticking percussion.

Rush Minute is quintessential latter-period Massive Attack with Del Naja weighing in with another claustrophobic vocal turn set against military rhythms and a moody two-note melody.

And there’s still time for the victory lap of Saturday Come Slow and Atlas Air. The former features a cracked and tender contribution from Damon Albarn on a warm bearhug of a track reminiscent of his superb recent side project The Good The Bad And The Queen while closer Atlas Air is another of Del Naja’s slow-building epics – there’s even a hands-in-the-air peak on the five-minute mark would you believe.

As with most things from Massive Attack, good things come to those who wait.

Released: February 8
STEVE HARNELL