3D (vox)
gee (vox)
angelo bruschini (guitar)
arden hart (synths/keyboards)
andrew smalls (drums)
winston blisset (bass)
horace andy (vox)
dot allison (vox/guitar)
deborah miller (vox)
lucy wilkins (violin)

The legends of trip-hop come together after four years for a mind blowing fusion of sound and visuals.

http://www.inthemix.com.au/photos4/030311-massiveattack-jeremyl

After the rolling bassline, a teaser on the LED screen, and a few vicious bursts of bass noise which could have been intentional or not, but helped raise the air of anticipation, the familiar bleeps of Future Proof kick in. Angelo strums on guitar, Dee appears, massive are back for their first show in 4 years! Bass kicks out of the huge floor stacks. Dee moans out a rendition fairly similar to the album version, with a little help from an effects unit which seems to harmonise and add echo to his voice. LED screen is comes to life, the possibilities of this thing are absolutely amazing.
Horace walks onto stage for Everywhen, his saunter from backstage in the dark is recognisably Horace, he's decked out resplendently in camos as I have come to expect from him. Horace's voice washes over me in a smooth wave of bliss, it's over before it began. 3D comes out with Gee, they're in good spirits, mock fighting and sharing words during the intro to Risingson, it's a perfect rendition of the tune. The core of the band from the Mezzanine tour remain, it's really tight, as are all the other live staples. Of course it is missing the 'I found a reason' sample from the Velvet Underground, but it isn't really noticeable.
Next to emerge from behind the screen is a figure with a guitar, a few unreconisable notes are played, the lights come up and we see that it is Dot Allison, and she's performing the new version of Black Milk. Bit of a strange tune, fits in with the 100th Window material, didn't really go down well.
Angel which gets the best response of the evening so far, probably owing to crowd familiarity, but again the band was really tight, Horace was absolutely faultless, but it's another version that hasn't really evolved from the Mezzanine tour.
Dot emerges again for Special Cases. Arden is responsible for playing lot of this tune live, unsure as to how much is pre-programmed, but he is definitely being kept busy behind his keyboards. Here Dot's voice is really given room to shine, maybe she tries a little too hard to emulate Sinéad's performance committed to tape. She is joined onstage for the first time by Lucy, doing a nice job on the violin.
3D takes the stage once again, this time for a bare-bones Butterfly Caught. I don't think the band had to actually do much for this, it is much more a drum machine led track than anything. Sounds a bit empty, and Dee's voice a little awkward without much instrumentation to hide behind, it's a relief when the track progresses a bit and Lucy helps out. The opening strains of the next song are completely alien yet somewhat instantly recognisable as Name Taken. It's a song without a lot of momentum, yet somewhat beautiful. The crowd response is lukewarm, maybe this isn't a track made for the live format. The next 3 tunes, Teardrop, Mezzanine and Hymn are all well-rehearsed and perfect, the latter Horace dedicates the next tune to 'All the conscious people in the house tonight,' as is expected. Safe From Harm is a brilliant version, a huge rock-out, complete with crazy additions from Arden, this promises what the later stages of the tour may be like, with more improvised bits over the existing structure. The LED screen has military statistics for the first half of the song, then for the vicious ending it explodes in a computer-game style display of war planes and many amazing visual effects. Definitely the highpoint of the gig so far, it's followed by a rendition of Inertia Creeps, which, while not being bad at all, is overshadowed by that which came before it. After the band leave and return to stage for their first encore, the anticipated 'Antistar' is belted out. It sounds really nice live, Lucy does an amazing solo, could definitely do with a few more minutes on this tune. Unfinished Sympathy is played, this time with Lucy doing the strings, Deborah does a really nice job of it. Actually starting to like her now that she isn't murdering Teardrop. She hams it up for the audience, dancing around during the extended ending of the tune, she gets a great response from the crowd, and she loves it.
The last encore is for the fantastic Group 4, the perfect song to end a gig. The beautiful interchange between Dot and Dee's vocal parts are wonderfully set off by the ferocious ending, with Dot adding to the huge noise with her own guitar, a really tight version, with the LED screen alight, it really is an assault on the senses. We are left in the dark with the same bassline washing over us as we struggle to digest what we have just experienced.
The core band of Andrew, Winston, Angelo and Arden are tight throughout, it's obvious they've been rehearsing a lot. Would have liked to have seen 3D and ND in control of the synths/samples, for more creative and spontaneous arrangements, but I guess it isn't that feasible. I'm very glad that they went with the choice to bring two vocalists for the two styles, Deborah has an amazing soul voice, but it just isn't suited for the whispery style of Liz and Sinéad, much in the same way that Dot wouldn't be able to handle Unfinished Sympathy. It really is the best way to have the parts performed.
I'm bit surprised that Euro Zero Zero or Karmacoma weren't played, seeing as though Gee was there, and only on for two songs. Plus these are both very popular tunes. Not too surprised by the omission of the tracks from Protection, although I think Dot could handle Protection (the song) admirably, would be nice to see Massive playing this one. It seems as though there are visuals/data assigned to each tune. At the changeover of each song the theme of the displayed information changed, I noticed computer/human virus data, 3 dimensional ASCII art captured from video (my personal favourite), binary code, html code, environmental data, periodic table data. It looks amazing, I don't know if it can be properly described. The potential for this is mindblowing. All in all, an amazing spectacle, the bare bones of what promises to be an evolving tour. The later shows will be interesting to compare to this, I just hope I get that chance. What an amazing evening spent being entertained by brilliant multi-media artists. One very happy fan.

Damian Vine

Massive Attack Melbourne For The Start of the World Tour New Zealand's loss was Melbourne's gain when Massive Attack suddenly rescheduled the start of their world tour last week.
Australia was originally scheduled to happen after New Zealand but due to current legal problems for main man 3D a.k.a. Robert Del Naja the tour was forced to be postponed and Melbourne's Rod Laver Arena was the host of the first Massive Attack live performance anywhere in the world for four years.
I had been informed prior to the show after questioning Massive Attack's choice of venue that Rod Laver was chosen purely because it was the only venue in Melbourne that could fit the stage. Sure enough, as the lights went down and 100th Window opener 'Future Proof ' began, it was evident this was true.
With a spectacular backdrop, incredible light show and simply fantastic songs, the audience could not have asked for anything more. It was not long before the spectacular Mezzanine album had a test, with 'Rising Son' and 'Angel' coming consecutively third and fourth, between which 3D commented on the "bullshit in the press" about him lately, the applause following suggested the audience's support for the vocalist.
The backdrop consisted of disturbingly relevant information such as today's news, the time, the weather, all up to date, even complete with Rod Laver Arena's Brunton Avenue address. None of this information was more disturbingly appropriate than the population and general ecology counters ticking away behind Horace Andy belting out his amazing voice to 'The Hymn of the Big Wheel'.
Two encores closed the show, the first containing the closest sound Massive Attack ever achieved to "dance" with one of their earliest hits, 'Unfinished Symphony' while the second contained 'Group Four' from their Mezzanine album with chaotic visuals keeping time with the crescendo to the climax.
I wouldn't even dare to compare this to Massive Attack's Festival Hall show on the Mezzanine tour. This is a whole new level for the group and I think the fans should be duly impressed.
By Tim Cashmere