KOMAKOMA - MASSIVE ATTACK live in Sofia

16 July 2010

MASSIVE ATTACK,В Martina Topley-Bird
15.07.2010,В 'Festivalna' Hall, Sofia - Bulgaria
words by Nasso Ruskov, photo: official

Meet up at 7:30 p.m...Snack-cab-venue...outside venue...familiar faces...more familiar faces...friends...mates...enemies...more mates...vodka...scorching heat...get in queue...move to adjacent queue...of course previous queue picks up the instant we leave...ah, bollocks...so many people...so few sandals....thank God!...We're in!...Martina Topley-Bird...plays new solo stuff...and some old solo stuff...applause...could have been more...most are still outside venue...trickling in...slowly, but surely...about 4-5,000...Bars, not enough...more queues...A little after 9 p.m...Lights go out...epic crowd roar goes up...Massive Attack onstage...Epiphany!

Roughly how a series of telegrams from Sofia's "Festivalna Hall" would read on Thursday night. This was without doubt, one of the most anticipated concerts here in the last 10-15 years.

Outside the venue was the place to meet all the people you hadn't seen for ages, plus all the ones you see on a regular basis. The crowd wasn't so much colourful, as varied. We walked in midway through Martina Topley-Bird's opening set, to be instantly enticed by her magical sound and voice. As well as singing with the headliners, Martina is also the support act for this current Massive Attack tour. Seems they like to keep it in the family then.

Her solo stuff deserves a separate article, but tonight people are too hyped up in anticipation of MA's set to fully concentrate on the opening act.В

MASSIVE ATTACK

We've all heard legends about the Massive Attack live experience. Well, they all turn out to be true. In fact, the full effect is way more powerful than we'd been preparing for. With two core members from the original Bristol gang, the progenitors of trip hop deliver a spectacular performance that has no analogue neither in the current, nor in any music scenes of the past.

They're simply in a league of their own and the myriad imitators to have popped up throughout the last 20 years always have and will be trailing somewhere far behind. Listening to the cosmic richness of their music one has a sense of some dark grim foreboding, of floating in the underwater, only to burst up on the surface in a ferocious, jagged wave of ruphoria. The heavy bass-laden rhythm hits you where you're most susceptible and weak.

Massive Attack live are thrice as challenging and threatening than on record. They're well intense and in fact, heavy!

MASSIVE ATTACK

It's no wonder the bloke in front of me, after going mental in 1001 ways, finally resorts to giving the metal horns and showing his love for the band with a series of Cannibal Corpse-stylee death metal growls.

It's all so elevating and apocalyptic too. But fear not. For they're on our side. They even entertain us with a series of headlines from various Bulgarian papers, displayed on the video screen in the background. The very same screen turns into a departures board, displaying and juxtaposing destinations, times and dates., as well as quotes from Mikhail Bakunin, William Hazlitt etc.

Even after twenty years, this is one angry band. But they're fighting our corner. Robert sincerely thanks us for spending our hard earned dosh on tickets in light of the current economic recession in Bulgaria. Rumours of internal unrest within the band have long been rife, but onstage this lot are as united as Leonidas' 300 Spartans.

MASSIVE ATTACK

The sound is crisp and the light show - phenomenal. Most tender moment of the gig goes to "Teardrop" (no surprise there), whilst "Angel" and "Future Proof" were both overwhelming grandiose epiphanies. Having seen Massive Attack in the UK, on their home soil, I can safely say that the Sofia crowd wins hands down. Perhaps that's why we got two encores, instead of one. Massive Attack, thank you and do come back please!

MASSIVE ATTACK В