Darren Aronofsky and JR outside their public outdoor art exhibit "The Standing March" in Paris.
Whilst eagerly waiting for next year's Massive Attack tour, 3D (along with Euan Dickinson) have scored the soundtracks to two distinct video projects which highlight the issue of climate change and fossil fuel lobbying.
The first of these projects, "The Standing March", is a public outdoor art exhibit directed by renowned French artist JR and Oscar nominated director Darren Aronofsky, with accompanying music by 3D and Euan Dickinson.
JR has previously worked with Massive Attack before with him providing certain LED visuals for the Heligoland tour and also in this 2011 video about JR and his art which Massive Attack scored with a untitled piece of new music at the time.
The Standing March exhibit involved the images of more than 500 people being projected onto the facade of France’s National Assembly building during the 2015 U.N. Climate Change Conference (COP21) in Paris to “remind leaders that the world is watching,” in the words of the artists behind the project. More information about The Standing March can be found in this Time Magazine article.
A video of this same projection can viewed in the embed below.
Video still from "La Fête est Finie", a short satricial film about climate change and fossil fuel lobbying, directed by Mark Donne and featuring new music from Massive Attack, Young Fathers and Forest Swords.
The 2nd project, "La Fête est Finie (The Party Is Over)", is a short satirical film directed and produced by Mark Donne, once again scored by 3D and Euan Dickinson, but also this time in joint collaboration with Young Fathers and Forest Swords. Young Fathers are of course also due to accompany Massive Attack as support on their European tour next year and will more than likely feature on the next Massive Attack album whenever that will be.
Mark Donne had previously produced the documentary film "The UK Gold", which Massive Attack contributed music to. Here is Mark's words regarding this new film in an interview with the Guardian newspaper.
“For decades fossil fuel extracting trans-nationals and western governments have continued to dance and partake long after the bright lights of climate science evidence were switched on and the deafening music of denial had its plug pulled. I was always struck by just how close those relationships are – how commonplace and everyday they are – and the sheer level of situational lobbying that goes on which often isn’t recorded in formal meetings with ministers and special advisers and the policy capture that’s able to be achieved via those gateways and those methods. Quite often these things are in spaces of hospitality, as with our film.”
Forest Swords in this Facebook post also seems to indicate the new track featured in "La Fête est Finie" will receive a separate release from the film at some point, possibly as the new material that was promised by Massive Attack to come out before the 2016 tour.
You can watch the short film and hear the fruits of this new Massive Attack collaboration in the embed below.
After a few mild teases in the last few days on their social media channels, Massive Attack announced today the arrival of a new 3 track EP entitled Eutopia. So at least we can say that 2020 isn’t a total write-off at least!
Another year nearly over and I'd thought I'd better write a quick blog post about what Massive Attack have been up to in 2017. Compared to 2016, this year has been relatively quiet, but we can only hope behind the scenes that its also been a good productive year for the band and that we can expect new music (and maybe, just maybe, a new album!) in 2018.
Embedded at the top of this post is a new documentary entitled "Where Do You Draw The Line?" from WordSmith Productions who have generously uploaded the entire hour long documentary to Vimeo for free as of today.