14 metrolife Thursday, February 4, 2010 D About Town THE HOTTEST TICKETS IN TOWN We have a pair of tickets to see HAUNTED Feb 9, Gaiety, 7.30pm For a chance to win, e-mail your answer to the question below to life@metroherald. ie by noon today with Hot Tickets in the subject line. With the answer include your name, address and a number where you can be contacted between 1pm and 3pm. Strictly one entry per person; entrants must be age 18 or over. Q. In which Brenda Blethyn film does she star as a marijuana plant-growing widow? A Lovely & Amazing B Saving Grace The winners of yesterdays tickets to see Amanda Palmer are: Clare OHare & Justin Perry Eimog Italian instrumentalists, whose experimental live performances have really shaped their recorded output including debut album Scenario which was released to critical acclaim last year Tonight, Whelans, 25 Wexford Street D2, 8pm, 10. Tel: 1890 200 078. www.eimog.com Karl Spain Haunted Further proof that were spoilt for choice when it comes to fundraising gigs is Christy Moores pairing with John Spillane for this double bill charity concert raising money for Goals Haiti earthquake appeal. Dig deep while the big cheeses of trad dip into a songbook of evergreen classics plus more recent material from Moores Listen album and Spillanes LP More Irish Songs We Learned At School Mar 23, Vicar Street, 58- 59 Thomas Street D8, 7.30pm, 39.50 to 59.50. Tel: 0818 719 300. www.goal.ie Book Now Aid For Haiti: Christy Moore/John Spillane metrometro lifeStaying In & Going Out The Big Interview Massive Attack Lords of Dance to be really exciting or f***ing scary and theres always the fear of failure. Marshall nods, amused: Fear is our motivating thing this could go wrong but were not going to let it. After Mezzanine, it didnt feel like we could ever work together as a three-piece, adds Marshall. This album is testament that we can actually go forward. The duos political streak is more explicit visually than lyrically. Heligolands title comes from a North Sea archipelago owned in turn by Denmark, Britain and Germany, while its artwork depicts a confused cultural character painted by Del Naja. It started off as a minstrel, a white man playing a black man, he says. Its about Britains history of being confused, what 1950s immigration means now, what our foreign policy will mean in 50 years, what flags mean, reality TV... Massive Attacks fearless, freeform approach to releasing albums is something they credit to their roots in Bristols Wild Bunch sound system. Their 1994 classic, Protection, was offset by a startling dub version entitled No Protection, while the multi-format Heligoland was heralded by the electro-blues groove of the Splitting The Atom EP and already features specially commissioned videos and an online remix package. We were always irreverent towards albums as DJs, says Del Naja. Heligoland will be an evolving piece with art, videos and so on. Now you can create and share things instantaneously. Thats how music should be. Its record companies that are f***ed, not music, says Marshall. Hes cut off by his bandmate suddenly swooping on the bar snacks, having spied the perfect specimen. An avalanche of pistachios tumbles into Del Najas laceless shoes. Let it go, mate, grins Marshall. Just let it go. Heligoland (Virgin) is out on Monday Now you can create and share things instantaneously. Thats how music should be wo men greet each other like brothers at a bar in Bristols Clifton district. Its the first time Robert Del Naja and Grant Marshall, aka Massive Attack linchpins 3D and Daddy G, have met up since Christmas and Del Naja is sporting snazzy leather shoes without laces. Its a leap of faith, he says of this fashion statement. It will be a leap of faith, observes Marshall, when you trip and go flying on your a***. The shoes are kicked off for a chat in advance of Massive Attacks fifth album release, Heligoland. Theres a complementary energy between the duo, creatively and even physically (wiry Del Naja scours a dish of bar snacks for the perfect nut; Marshall elegantly sprawls across the upholstery). Previously, the tense undertones that characterise Massive Attacks music have also shaken the bands relationships; co- founder Mushroom departed following their third album, Mezzanine, in 1998 and its 2003 follow-up, 100th Window, was essentially Del Najas solo vision. More recently, Marshall and Del Naja have reunited in the studio and built Heligoland from scratch. It was a mixed bag of changes, says Del Naja. One of the first chapters of this new record was working with Damon Albarn. The resulting guitar-tinged track, Saturday Come Slow, features Albarn at his most plaintive-sounding, while Heligoland also hosts guest vocals from TV On The Radios Tunde Adebimpe, Guy Garvey, Martina Topley-Bird and honey-voiced key collaborator Horace Andy. Wed never make a deliberately star- studded album but when you see these people perform, you know there are so many possibilities, explains Del Naja. You cant capture what they do in a nutshell and thats what makes working with them so much fun. Its always going T The Bristol dance aces tell Arwa Haider about reuniting for fifth album Heligoland, picking collaborators and their political vision GIG Cobra Starship The comic headlines this weeks mirthfest, performing alongside British comedian Zoe Lyons, emerging Irish talent Ciaran Lawless and the irrepressible lawyer-turned-funnyman Keith Farnan Until Sat, The Laughter Lounge, Eden Quay D1, 7pm, 25. Tel: 1800 266 339. www.laughterlounge.com Brenda Blethyn, Niall Buggy and Beth Cooke star in Edna OBriens play about a Shakespeare-quoting husband whose world is turned upside down by a young elocution teacher Tonight until Feb 13, Gaiety Theatre, King Street South D2, 7.30pm (Sat mat 2.30pm), 25 to 42.50. Tel: (01) 677 1717. www.gaietytheatre.ie Still Massive: Grant Marshall and Robert Del Naja Cobra Starship are what happens when punk rock goes to the mall and spends the afternoon sulking in the food-court. Part of the second wave of emo bands which have sprung up in the shadow of Blink 182, Fall Out Boy et al, these multiply pierced New Yorkers traffic in catchy odes to adolescent disaffection that, on first hearing, seem to owe as much to Avril Lavignes Sk8er Boi as to the three- chord vitriol of Black Flag. You can get a sense of what they are about from their song-titles. Snakes On A Plane (Bring It), Good Girls Go Bad and the Church Of Hot Addiction testify to Cobra Starships arrested emotional development and love of cheesy riffola (with its sci-fi sleeve, new album, Hot Mess, meanwhile, could be mistaken for a long-lost Darkness record). Thus far, its a formula that has paid off impressively. Signed to Fall Out Boy label Fueled By Ramen, a 2008 cover version of Katy Perrys I Kissed A Girl (saucily retitled I Kissed A Boy) turned Cobra Starship into proper chart contenders; since then, theyve blazed a trail headlining the emo- rific Warped Tour and collaborated with Gossip Girl star Leighton Meester. Their Dublin date is part of their first ever European tour, a jaunt which the band have dubbed Hot Mess Across The EU-Niverse. With punning powers like that at your disposal, who cares what the critics think? Eamon de Paor Tonight, Academy, 57 Middle Abbey Street D1, 6pm, 16.50. Tel: 0818 719 300. www.cobrastarship.com index.html2.html3.html4.html5.html6.html7.html8.html9.html10.html11.html12.html13.html14.html15.html16.html17.html18.html19.html20.html21.html22.html23.html24.html25.html26.html27.html