Massive Attack - Mezzanine: The Samples

We've covered the work of Eightminutesupsidedown many times, showing samples used by the Prodigy, Daft Punk and many others on their seminal works. Here we have the Mezzanine Edition of the show, taking a look at an iconic album by Bristol's Massive Attack. Always good to see where our musical heroes got their inspiration from! Here is some more details on the album:

Mezzanine is the third studio album by English electronic music group Massive Attack, released on 20 April 1998 by Circa and Virgin Records. For the album, the group began to explore a darker aesthetic, and focused on a more atmospheric style influenced by British post-punk, industrial music, hip hop and dub music
Mezzanine topped the charts in the United Kingdom, Australia, Ireland, and New Zealand, becoming the group's most commercially successful album to date. It has appeared on multiple "best albums" lists, and is now widely regarded as one of the greatest albums of the 1990s. The album spawned four singles, "Risingson", "Teardrop", "Angel" and "Inertia Creeps", which also variously charted in the United Kingdom. 

Background and recording
Mezzanine was conceptualized by lead Massive Attack member Robert Del Naja in 1997, who wanted to focus on exploring a darker audiovisual aesthetic with distinct influences. The production of the album was a stressful process; with tensions arising, it led to disagreements that almost split the group, including discouragement from Andrew Vowles. As a demonstration of the project's sound, Del Naja initially produced instrumental demos sampling songs by British post-punk bands such as Wire and Gang of Four, who had been familiar to him as artists he had enjoyed as a teenager.

Grant Marshall supported this direction as he wanted to depart from the "urban soul" of their previous album, Protection, but Vowles was sceptical
The sessions continued with Vowles and Marshall working on bass and drum loops, while Del Naja continued to produce demos. The album was originally set to be released in December 1997, but was delayed by four months, with Del Naja spending most of the time in the studio "making tracks, tearing them apart, f***ing [sic] them up, panicking, then starting again." Before the album's release, the group released "Superpredators", a non-album song extensively sampling Siouxsie and the Banshees' song "Metal Postcard", for the soundtrack to the 1997 film The Jackal; the track was subsequently included on the Japanese version of Mezzanine.

Andrew "Mushroom" Vowles left the group soon after the album's release, due to creative conflicts, while reggae artist and Massive Attack collaborator Horace Andy contributed to the album on multiple songs. The album's working title was Damaged Goods, which was the name of Gang of Four's 1978 debut single

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