Melissa on the road: Writing about Massive Attack...

07/01/2017

Writing about Massive Attack...

'Out of the Comfort Zone' - From Paris to England...

Hello everyone.

I'm currently working on the English version of my book on Massive Attack and Bristol...
The aim is to get the book to be out in the UK / US next year.

And I'll be back in England mid-January 2017 to talk about the book a bit more, first on the BBC.

This fascinating story takes us from the jazz and reggae scenes born in the 60s in the West Country to the incredible show Massive Attack gave in their hometown last September, for the first time in a decade.

Massive Attack on stage for the very own festival in Bristol, on The Downs, in September 2016

From The Pop Group and Black roots to The Wild Bunch, the years 1977-87 have been incredibly formative for those who would come to define the sound of the nineties and beyond.

Named in the French version 'En dehors de la zone de confort' ('Out of the Comfort Zone'), my book tells the story behind the rare group of politically aware bands in the UK, bands who produced a revolutionary sound and always tried to also bring a form of consciousness in their discourse.

The book cover has been created from an astonishing and mesmerizing artwork by Robert Del Naja himself, originally designed in 2009 for the E.P. named 'Atlas Air'. Deep recognition for his generous agreement to use it for this book.

The book starts with Massive Attack's first album, the remarkable and inimitable Blue Lines, and goes back to their first influences. This includes their very own hometown, Bristol, a port city that has been enriched by the colonies in America, the sugar and the slave trade in the eighteenth century. That very history also provoked a counter reaction and a sense of rebellion in its inhabitants, who fought against slavery a few decades later and rioted against unfair political decisions, inequalities, big corporations, etc.

This sense of rebellion materialized in the city's culture from the 1960s and mainly the 1970s, when the Caribbean population imported their very onw reggae music in the city's homes and clubs just before Bristol gave birth to its own punk and post-punk movement.

Then started Bristol's homegrown sound with the unforgettable band The Pop Group - and friends like Nick Sheppard and his band, The Cortinas, Maximum Joy, the Glaxo Babies, etc.

From then started a new movement.

A few years later, hip hop and electronic music started to pour into Bristol's records shops and nightclubs and a new generation of DJs started to bloom. From that trend came to life the now legendary Wild Bunch, a collective that changed the game and gave to Bristol its gateway into the history of music. The Wild Bunch was originally an informal posse composed of the joined efforts of two young Black DJs, Miles Johnson, known as DJ Milo, and Grantley Marshall, nicknamed Daddy G. They were quickly joined by Nellee Hooper, a massive fan of punk music, who acted as a sort of producer / manager.

The Wild Bunch was enriched in 1983 by a couple of MCs and by the first blooming and generally admired graffiti artist in the city, nicknamed 3D, aka in real life Robert Del Naja, an 18 year-old music junkie.

After years of adventures that this book retells, Grant and 3D formed Massive Attack in 1988 with their young friend DJ Mushroom and their talent soon outburst everywhere else in the UK when they released their first album in 1991.

In their path came to form a large number of other bands, producers and DJs, including the well-known Tricky and Portishead. A few years later, the graffiti movement 3D invigorated and revolutioned also took off in a wider scale.

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I wanted to write about Massive Attack's relationship with their city, Bristol, to show the roots of their greatness & mention their predecessors. To demonstrate how the city's history had a major influence on these self-taught and conscious, rebellious artists.

I then realized it would also be fascinating to retell the band's links with the artists and musicians who followed them, with their many brilliant collaborators and with those they inspired, from UNKLE to Gorillaz.

The book follows Massive Attack's journey in the UK and further away around the world, via their tours and collaborations, in America and in the Middle East notably.

Therefore, this book becomes a form of parallel history of British culture, from an underground and unorthodox point of view. Bristol epitomizes another side of England, less known and much more humorous and rebellious!

It's now been almost two years that I'm coming regularly to Bristol, interviewing musicians, artists and other local actors - and first and foremost the brilliant, intelligent, overtalented Robert Del Naja, a real artist, an incredibly open, curious and cultivated mind, too discrete and so humble it was hard to believe so much modesty could match his bubbling and unstoppable creativity. He is also deeply aware of world affairs and engaged into holding a discourse though his music and his art; and for that rare boldness we should all be thankful.

I also travelled to Dublin, Sicily, London and Belfast - to see them on stage, witness their creations or meet some of their collaborators or musicians and artists they inspired, also following the evolution of the UK, from the last general election to the referendum on the so-called "Brexit"... Meanwhile, they came twice to Paris for three wonderful shows.