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They say the physical single is dying out. I suppose in this iTunes era, were music can be consumed at the click of a button, that that is probably true.

And that is even more truer for bands such as Massive Attack, who for a long time now, have been a self-proclaimed “albums band”. I guess if you look at the chart performance of some of their most iconic songs in the UK at least, you’ll get the idea. Even their most popular single, Teardrop, barely scraped the UK Top 10 at #10 back in April 1998. Undoubtedly, if that was now it would’nt even get that high (unless being a bad cover version for charity, of course).

There’s also the whole collecting end of physical music that you don’t get with downloads, as the picture of my Massive Attack singles collection right above will attest, which is a shame as the old idea of pre-packaged music in single form seems to be mostly gone in Massive Attack’s case, when you consider there was no physical singles off their last album, Heligoland.

The compromise to that was the Vinyl Factory limited edition E.P’s, but unfortunately I’m generally against the release of limited edition only singles when real fans, who would like to feel some ownership over the music, can’t get hold of them initially and are charged an arm and leg for them on Ebay.

I could go on lamenting the death of the physical single, but I’ll cut to the chase with this post, which is a poll to find out what your favourite Massive Attack single is.

When I’m talking about singles, I’m not necessarily meaning just the song on its own, but the whole package including remixes, b-sides (if any), the accompanying promo video and the cover artwork. On those grounds, I’m going to have to go with Inertia Creeps as being my favourite single release from Massive.

It was a close call between it and Karmacoma. Both have a great bunch of remixes, the two most rewatchable Massive Attack promo videos to date and some nice sleevage to show off on your shelf. Inertia Creeps clinches it though for having Reflection, one of the best of Massive Attack’s many great b-sides. Sometimes I even insert it into the running order of Mezzanine, where it feels right at home.

So if you would like to take a second out a give a vote in the poll about what your favourite singles package is from the Massive, your more than welcome.

I’ve also gathered together the majority of all the remixes/b-sides on all 16 Massive Attack singles from 1990-2010 (thank god for YouTube ), just in case you need a helpful reminder of what’s on each single.

Daydreaming

 

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Unfinished Sympathy

 

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Safe From Harm

 

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Massive Attack E.P

 

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Sly

 

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Protection

 

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Karmacoma

 

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Risingson

 

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Teardrop

 

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Angel

 

 

 

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Inertia Creeps

 

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Special Cases

 

 

 

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Butterfly Caught

 

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Live With Me

 

 

 

 

 

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Splitting The Atom E.P

 

 

 

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Atlas Air E.P