Iraq accepted all of the UN's resolutions the same day. On 28 February, President George Bush announced a ceasefire and that the Iraq Army had been defeated. The sleeve to Blue Lines, with the "Massive Attack" name restored. The single peaked at Number 13 on 10 March 1991, by which time the Gulf War was over. Massive Attack weren't the only artist affected - Bomb The Bass, best known for their hit Beat Dis, briefly went under the name of their main performer and producer, Tim Simenon.ĭespite the mild controversy, Unfinished Sympathy crept into the chart the week of release just outside the Top 50, thanks to a brilliant video that saw Shara Nelson walk the length of a Los Angeles street in one continuous take. Mushrrom, Shara Nelson and 3D on the set of the short-lived TV show Friday At The Dome in May 1991. "We don't want to be provocative in the current situation, and with some records not being played on the radio because of their titles, we didn't want to be banned." "The lyrics might not necessarily be about war," a BBC spokesman told the industry paper Music Week on 2 February 1991, "but if they were played after a bulletin which announced a tragedy, it would be offensive."Ĭirca Records' Managing Director Ray Cooper explained to the same magazine that artwork for Massive Attack's forthcoming album Blue Lines had been scrapped at a cost of "£10,000". The BBC claimed that there was no outright ban on these tracks, but they had compiled a list of songs for local stations that may be thought to be insensitive coming out of a news report that detailed British casualties. The sleeve artwork to Unfinished Sympathy by "Massive". The New Statesman published a list of the 67 songs that were deemed by the broadcaster to be sensitive in light of the conflict, which included (for obvious reasons) Blondie's Atomic, Pat Benatar's Love Is A Battlefield and - with an eye on the Middle Eastern locale of the battle - Walk Like An Egyptian by The Bangles.īecause of this cautious approach, Massive Attack's label Circa made the decision to amend the trio's name for the release of Unfinished Sympathy - on the sleeve and label, they were just called " Massive". However, with the Gulf War raging, the BBC had decided to place an unofficial ban on certain songs and artists who they claimed would have been "unsuitable" for airplay while British friends, relatives and loved ones were serving in the Middle East. Into this atmosphere came the release of Massive Attack's Unfinished Sympathy, which was pencilled in for a release date of Monday 11 February 1991. Gilles BASSIGNAC/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images)Īir bombings on Iraq went on for the next 42 days and nights. After months of building coalition forces in the region, the general offensive against Iraq began on 17 January 1991. Since August 1990, the British military had been part of a coalition of forces engaged in the Gulf War after Iraq had invaded the neighbouring state of Kuwait over control of oil production in the area. However, there was one problem to solve before the trio could go any further. Massive Attack ended up having to sell their communal car to pay for the string session, but it was agreed that the finished product was worth it. Originally using keyboards for the string section, the band decide to shell out for a real orchestra, which created a different atmosphere for the track, which - thanks to a joke about the string arrangement - became known as Unfinished Sympathy. Together with producer Jonathan Sharp aka Johnny Dollar, the trio worked up Nelson's idea into a full song. Nelson had been toying with a song idea during sessions at Bristol's Coach House studio, which was then known as "Kiss And Tell". Shara Nelson, vocalist and co-writer of Unfinished Sympathy. The track featured singer Shara Nelson, who had known the trio since the days of The Wild Bunch, where she'd sung on their cover of The Look Of Love, the b-side to the 1987 single Tearin' Down The Avenue. Released in April 1991, the LP was trailed by a remarkable single called Unfinished Sympathy. Their debut album was Blue Lines, recorded over eight months in 1990 "with breaks for Christmas and the World Cup", according to Del Naja.
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