Massive Attack at Brisbane Entertainment Centre. Photo by Kelsey Doyle (@kjdoyle)

A monolithic LED looms over the stage, numbers and words flickering on and off screen as the members of Massive Attack’s live band walk on in the dark.

The audience, a mix of original Massive Attack fans and 20 somethings who wouldn’t look out of place in footage from the band’s shows in the 90s, are ecstatic. After all, this is the band’s first Australian show in 16 years.

The visuals behind the band are the collaborative work of half of Massive Attack, Robert Del Naja aka 3D, and filmmaker Adam Curtis of United Visual Artists, and have been part of their live sets from 2024 onwards, 20 years after the pair’s first collaboration.

Precisely woven into the set, the visuals are disorienting, confronting, at times satirical and always demanding your attention. An apt way to get across the types of messages Massive Attack have to deliver.

The set kicks off with a melancholic cover of Gigi d’Agostino’s ‘In My Mind’, as 3D and Grant Marshall aka Daddy G join the rest of the band on stage. The screen switches to an algorithmic feed, showing images of war, influencers and a TikTok asking “is your face shape ‘rich’ or ‘poor”?

Then it’s straight into ‘Risingson’, quickly followed by ‘Black Milk’, another Mezzanine favourite. The crowd goes wild as Elizabeth Fraser of the Cocteau Twins is introduced by Del Naja. The star studded set features not only Fraser but also Massive Attack’s “collaborator in chief” Horace Andy and even Deborah Miller.

Massive Attack at Brisbane Entertainment Centre. Live sketch by Blithe Fielden (@blithe_illustrations)

‘Girl I Love You’ with Horace Andy features visuals relating to the rise of notorious surveillance tech company Palantir. As the chorus hits, custom made facial recognition software scans the crowd and displays audience members’ faces across the large LED. A globe appears towards the end of the track, starting with a pinpoint at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre before showing just how prevalent Palantir’s tech is across the world. Locally, you may have recently seen or heard about Coles installing Palantir surveillance systems in their supermarkets.

The show is as informative as it is captivating and I find myself frantically typing notes into my phone many times throughout the set, trying to get things down before they disappear. One particular example is during a cover of Seo Taiji And Boys’ track ‘Regret Of The Times’. I’m unfamiliar but intrigued by the words on screen pointing to it as an example of K Pop’s roots in protest and quickly note it down to research further after the show.

The track is accompanied by a mix of footage of the 1980 Gwangju pro democracy movement and Israel’s actions in Gaza, before switching to a blank screen asking “where is the new music that will galvanise the resistance”? The track ‘Safe From Harm’ is dedicated to the people of Palestine, recontextualising its meaning. It’s met with enthusiastic chants back from the crowd.

Massive Attack live at Brisbane Entertainment Centre. Photo by Kelsey Doyle (@kjdoyle)

Some heavy hitters close out the latter half of what has already been one of the most memorable concert experiences, including ‘Inertia Creeps’, an incredible rendition of my favourite Massive Attack song, ‘Angel’ featuring Horace Andy, a phenomenal performance by Deborah Miller on ‘Unfinished Sympathy’ and of course ‘Teardrop’, again featuring Elizabeth Fraser.

Massive Attack have packed a lot into this set and have done so intentionally and effectively. Despite the narrative that I’ve seen another particular review of this show trying to spin, the night ended in a standing ovation from the Brisbane, Magandjin audience who seemed very much in awe of the performance they had just witnessed. Everything is inextricably political and as Massive Attack points out in a post to their Substack, “these moments of collective galvanisation in any cultural space matter, perhaps now more so than ever”.

Photo gallery by Kelsey Doyle (@kjdoyle)

Live Review: Massive Attack at Brisbane Entertainment Centre

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