Massive Attack

Seven years in the making, “Heligoland” has kept Massive Attack fans waiting a long time. Finally, this British trip-hop duo is releasing their fifth studio album, their first since 2003. Though, in their absence, Massive Attack has been somewhat eclipsed by their contemporaries—most notably the recently-reunited Portishead—“Heligoland” marks a bold resurgence into the musical scene for duo Robert Del Naja and Grant Marshall. Massive Attack’s new record is a dark dreamscape, totally engrossing in its vigor, proving that “Heligoland” was well worth the wait.

On this LP as elsewhere, Massive Attack’s music can tend towards the formulaic. Take a catchy beat, drench it in spare, sinister loops, mix in some guest vocals and voilá—the songs on “Heligoland” rarely deviate from the template. As a result, it’s sometimes easy for the tracks to fall into a lull or feel stagnant. “Girl I Love You” and “Flat of the Blade,” though solid tracks overall, are prime examples of this kind of stasis, failing to offer any novel interpretation of what Massive Attack have been doing for years.

At the same time, however, the band prove that sticking to a formula, if the method of choice is strong enough, can produce stunning results. And when all is said and done, “Heligoland” subscribes to a pretty good method. Nobody does the bleak soundscapes and skittering breakbeats that characterize trip-hop, which Massive Attack themselves helped pioneer, to greater effect than Del Naja and Marshall. So for the most part, the songs of “Heligoland” are highly successful. These ten tracks are united around a dark, chilling vision that completely absorbs the listener into the album’s world.

The record opens with “Pray for Rain,” a song composed with such a hypnotic vigor that it risks eclipsing most of the tracks to come. A seething piano loop winds its way through cascading drum fills while Tunde Adebimpe (of TV on the Radio fame) warbles chilling lyrics laced with somber imagery—“Dull residue of what once was / A shattered cloud of swirling doves.” The song also has a more distinct arc than any other on the album. It’s the only track with a clear bridge, and it builds to a climactic resolution that inundates the listener in an icy, placid pool of electronic harmonies. The end product is a song that grips with remarkable force, immediately establishing the album’s dark, baleful atmosphere.

“Paradise Circus”—the album’s other exceptional track—starts with the simple, skeletal chiming of piano and the glassy ambiance of vibraphone. A heavy bass line kicks in soon thereafter, and drives the song to the album’s musical apex. Mazzy Star’s Hope Sandoval lends her voice to this particular track, and her airy recitation of the lyrics only adds to the disquieting mood of the song. “Oh well, the devil makes us sin,” she coos, “but we like it when we’re spinning in his grip.” At its conclusion, sweeping strings elevate the sinister tone of the song to a truly overwhelming effect.

Along with Adebimpe and Sandoval, Massive Attack enlist the help of several guest artists to varying degrees of success. Eight of the ten tracks borrow vocals from other musicians, and for the most part, their efforts are much appreciated. There’s a great deal of variety in the voices that carry the melodies of “Heligoland,” a welcome dose of diversity on an album that tends towards monotony in its musical textures.

One of these appearances is less than impressive, however—that of Horace Andy, a reggae musician and an oft-collaborator of Massive Attack. Andy appears on two tracks to a disconcerting effect, as his voice feels grossly misplaced in the middle of these songs. For instance, he lends his deep, raspy bass to the first single off the album, “Splitting the Atom,” and his vocals sound too breathy for the song’s sleek backdrop, distracting from one of the best musical compositions on the album.

In spite of such minor flaws, however, “Heligoland” is a resounding success. While the past seven years may have seemed like a great hiatus in music-making, the efforts that went into this album were clearly time-intensive, and they were not wasted. With a host of tracks that are at once arresting, menacing, and beautiful, “Heligoland” reestablishes Massive Attack’s captivating musical aesthetic and proves to be a bold reminder that Del Naja and Marshall are still going as strong as ever.