100th Window

100th Window
Studio album by Massive Attack
Released 10 February 2003
Recorded 2001–2002, Sony Studios
Genre Trip hop, electronica, minimal techno
Length 73:52
Label Virgin Records
Producer Robert Del Naja, Neil Davidge
Massive Attack chronology
Singles 90/98
(1998)		 100th Window
(2003)		 Danny the Dog
(2004)
Singles from 100th Window
  1. "Special Cases"
    Released: 24 February 2003
  2. "Butterfly Caught"
    Released: 16 June 2003

100th Window is the fourth studio album from the Bristol-based trip-hop group Massive Attack. Of the band's original core trio, the album only features Robert Del Naja. Andrew Vowles departed shortly after the release of Mezzanine, and Grant Marshall refused to participate in the making of the record.

Released in February 2003, 100th Window was written and produced by Del Naja and Neil Davidge, and features vocals from Horace Andy, Sinéad O'Connor and Damon Albarn (performing as 2D). It is the first album by the band that made no use of samples, and contains none of the jazz or jazz fusion stylings of the Blue Lines or Protection recordings.

Background

Work on the album started in early 2000 at the Christchurch Studios in Clifton, Bristol. Massive Attack recruited Lupine Howl (a band made up of ex-members of Spiritualized) for the new album. In a November 2001 interview, Lupine Howl's lead singer Sean Cook described the sessions as "very experimental ... that essentially consisted of kinda minimal loops and noises that were fed to our head phones from the computer up in the control room. Then we would have this sort of extended jam session playing along to them and they would do various things to do the loops. Sometimes they would drop out the loop, sometimes they would start processing it with effects and delays and stuff like that, to try and make it change in various ways and see what that would do in terms of our playing. They also had a strobe light in the live room, which they controlled from the control room. They would kind of put that on and speed it up to dictate the intensity and try to affect the way we played with the lighting. It was a really good laugh; we got some good stuff. I mean, hours and hours of stuff, which they have taken back and cut up and arranged and done their things to."[1]

In a 17 July 2002 posting to Massive Attack's forums Del Naja wrote that over the course of time, the band had become "very unhappy with the shapes being formed", and that by the beginning of 2002 they had discarded most of the material that was written up to that point. As a result, Lupine Howl is not credited with any contributions to the final album. However, one song from those sessions, "Nature of Threat", was later made available for download on Massive Attack's website.

Reception

Professional ratings
Aggregate scores
SourceRating
Metacritic75/100[2]
Review scores
SourceRating
Allmusic[3]
IGN8.8/10[4]
Mojo[5]
Pitchfork Media5.1/10[6]
Robert Christgau[7]
Rolling Stone[8]
Spin[9]
Stylus MagazineB[10]
Uncut[11]
Vibe[12]

Initial critical response to 100th Window was positive. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album has received an average score of 75, based on 25 reviews.[2]

Track listing

All tracks written by Robert "3D" Del Naja and Neil Davidge except tracks 2, 4 & 6 written by Del Naja/Davidge/O'Connor

No. Title Length
1. "Future Proof" (vocals by 3D) 5:37
2. "What Your Soul Sings" (vocals by Sinéad O'Connor) 6:37
3. "Everywhen" (vocals by Horace Andy) 7:37
4. "Special Cases" (vocals by Sinéad O'Connor) 5:09
5. "Butterfly Caught" (vocals by 3D) 7:33
6. "A Prayer for England" (vocals by Sinéad O'Connor) 5:44
7. "Small Time Shot Away" (vocals by 3D, backing vocals by 2D) 7:57
8. "Name Taken" (vocals by Horace Andy) 7:47
9. "Antistar (includes instrumental hidden track "LP4")" (vocals by 3D) 19:40

Personnel

Orchestra arrangement by Craig Pruess, Neil Davidge and Robert "3D" Del Naja

Charts

Chart (2003) Peak
position
Poland [13] 1
UK Albums Chart[14] 1

References

  1. ↑ Mark Redfern (June 2002). "Under the Radar – Lupine Howl". Archived from the original on 12 November 2006. Retrieved 15 November 2006.
  2. 1 2 100th Window at Metacritic Retrieved 7 October 2011.
  3. ↑ Bush, John. "100th Window Massive Attack". Allmusic. Retrieved 28 October 2011.
  4. ↑ Spence D. (25 February 2003). "100th Window – Music Review at IGN". Music.ign.com. Archived from the original on 16 January 2010. Retrieved 6 September 2011.
  5. ↑ 3/03, p.97
  6. ↑ Ott, Chris (4 February 2003). "Massive Attack: 100th Window | Album Reviews". Pitchfork. Retrieved 26 September 2016.
  7. ↑ "CG: massive attack". Robert Christgau. Retrieved 6 September 2011.
  8. ↑ Archived 17 January 2010 at WebCite
  9. ↑ 3/03, pp.117–8
  10. ↑ "Massive Attack – 100th Window – Review". Stylus Magazine. Retrieved 15 February 2013.
  11. ↑ 3/03, p.104
  12. ↑ 4/03, p.178
  13. ↑ "Olis Oficjalna lista sprzedaży". 24 February 2003.
  14. ↑ "Official Albums Chart Top 100". Official Charts Company. 22 February 2003. Retrieved 30 January 2016.

External links

Preceded by
Simply Deep by Kelly Rowland		 UK number one album
22–28 February 2003 		Succeeded by
Justified by Justin Timberlake
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