1991 - UK
Trip-Hop, Soul, Dub
With Horace Andy, Shara Nelson, Tony Bryan, Tricky, and 3D all participating for the vocals (even with Neneh Cherry doing back vocals on Hymn for the Big Wheel, really feels like the collective work of a small community meshing together all the music that shaped their musical education. Considering this album as trip-hop is a bit anachronic since the word was only coined three years later. So what kind of music is this? Hip-hop, dub, soul, dance, all soaked in nightclub culture. But what's even more impressive with Blue Lines, is how well we hear those influences, while completely freeing themselves from the burden of the musicallegacy. On the final song, Hymn to the Big Wheel, we can already hear their will to raise awareness (poetically more than pragmatically for now on climate change. Blue Lines feels like the last album of music veterans, just like Talk Talk's last records. But hopefully for us, Blue Lines starts the career of a band that will continue to bring their music further.
About Safe From Harm :
The opening song of Blue Lines is made around a sample of Bill Cobham's Stratus. Sung by Shara Nelson, this beautiful track is one of Massive Attack's darkest. As if the band was taking us back to Scorsese's Taxi Driver, we follow the singing of a woman protecting her child from the rest of the world, populated by potential aggressors anxiously portrayed by 3D's vocals. Shara Nelson's vocals carry the whole song while the production relentlessly stays the same throughout the entire song, during the chorus, refrain and bridge, spreading this feeling of danger we can deeply feel, while Nelson acts as our protector, the one who will do whatever she can to stand up and face whatever threats will try to come after what's hers. Massive Attack's characters are not heroes, but they are not inactive souls either. They are observing their surroundings, ready to retaliate every time their rights might be endangered. Still today, this is Massive Attack's philosophy.