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Rating: BLACK MAGIC (in 11 shades of gray).
Even the cover of this prestigious and now hard-to-find box set seduces us quite a bit. Here is indeed a rare example of smart packaging (printed on thermo-sensitive material that lightens with the touch of human warmth) applied to a vital and structural project like that of Massive Attack. Inside the box, there are 11 single CDs, each with its own case in 11 different shades of gray, featuring various tracks from their 90/98 repertoire, interpreted and remixed in different cuts and arrangements: one track per disc in 3/4 versions, revamped and enriched by various "guest stars" revolving around Massive during those years. An ambitious if not monumental work, an interesting "in-progress" project that opens a glimpse into Massive's production underworld, on the production choices made or not before an album's release ("Mezzanine" specifically) and, of course, makes us reflect on how many "out-takes" are inevitably discarded with often questionable yet entirely respectable choices. Incredible in this regard, beyond the presence of artists like Perfecto, Portishead, Almamegretta, Mad Professor, Damon Albarn, Graham Coxon, Manic Street Preachers, Brian Eno, and others, the stylistic coherence of a sound that irrevocably marked the best trip-hop sound of those years. There's all the style, the cold gloom, the powerful and relentless beat, the icy and seductive singing in its "being satanic and angelic at the same time," the ever-innovative and down-tempo sounds in a mix that has garnered followers worldwide, granting Massive Attack the right to enter the league of "bands that matter" in music history. A fairly long work, with some rare moments of fatigue (we're talking about nearly 6 hours of music!), but that takes nothing away from the splendid "black magic" that the Bristol group managed to unleash from this "Pandora's box" where everything fits, everything is offsetly aligned with the "unified body" of the project itself, where emotions move to the rhythm of one's heartbeat, where the unchanged class and unmatched style spread from the first to the last track, whether manipulated by Eno or the now-defunct Almamegretta (some tracks, from the early '90s, are still predominantly of blues and soul derivation, but it's in the whole that the work functions).
An unmissable box set, further proof of how the "Massive Project" was (or still is) something structured and with its feet firmly on the ground, but with its heart launched into the near future. A future that will probably be ever blacker and will have to painstakingly pass through all this range of... irresistible grays! A must-collect.
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