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Sep 08, 2009 By Kyle Lemmon Massive Attack

If you haven’t noticed already, Massive Attack is back and they’re bringing their friends. The trip hop progenitors are preparing the path for a new as-yet-to-be-titled album in February, by releasing their first new material in three years, in the form of a preview remix EP called Splitting the Atom (out October 6th on EMI/Virgin). The remix EP features longtime collaborator Horace Andy, TV on the Radio leader Tunde Adebimpe, Tricky muse Martina Topley-Bird, Elbow’s Guy Garvey, and hot remixers, Van Rivers & The Subliminal Kid and Christoff Berg.

In our exclusive interview with Grant “Daddy G” Marshall (“G”), he discusses some of the opportunities of being a group in the 21st century, tentative plans to release “stems” to their fans to remix, and why they took so long to record their follow-up to 2003’s 100th Window. There’s also those new releases to go over and Marshall discusses the trip hop duo’s overall theme for Atom frankly: “Basically it is about looking at things in black and white and the way that we approach things in life, whether it’s an argument, something we construct or a conversation; there’s always a split in the moment. These are the sorts of things that make up our lives.”

The group may have seen its fair share of internal problems during the recording of 100th Window, but Marshall assures us that all that is behind them. He’s more concerned with the current political climate of the U.K. “[The 1980s were] really the dark ages for us,” he says from Attack’s Bristol studio. “Over the years it’s gotten better but now it seems like it’s all starting again… The Labour Party is in power now and that is basically the same middle-to-right stance we’ve had in politics, where we thought we would have a more middle-to-left.” The dark tone of Splitting the Atom bears that argument out, esepcially on the morose “conversation on war” title track with Tunde Adebimpe. To read about all of the above, plus info on Massive Attack’s new drummer, Julien Brown and the duo’s dwindling use of sampes in the studio, check out the full interview here.

(www.massiveattack.com)