massive attack- unfinished sympathy

 massive attack-unfinished sympathy

           

Unfinished sympathy was produced in1990 and released in February 11th 1991 in which was disrupted through Circa Records as a trip hop genre song for the British band; Massive attack. This song was released as the bands second single for there debut album. Unfinished sympathy was written by the three band members Robert "3D" Del Naja, Andrew"mushroom" Vowles an Grant

daddy G" Marshall, the songs vocalist Share Nelson and the groups co-producer Jonathon "Jonny Dollar" Sharp. Once Unfinished Sympathy was released as a single it reached the Dutch Top 20 and also became a top 20 hit on the singles chart of countries including Switzerland and the UK.

In the music video for Unfinished Sympathy (directed by Baillie Walsh) the whole of the video is shot in one scene walking down a corrupt street in LA. At the beginning the camera is zoomed in on a silver shiny pair of Chinese dress balls being held in a persons hand but once it zooms out you become instantly overwhelmed that a very sinister looking gangsta with a Pit-bull (known as one of the fiercest dog breeds in the world) and with a whole gang in the background (who was an actual gang which lived in the area) is holding them. After the camera goes to a high angle shot of the gang the camera quickly goes back down towards a young child which is around eleven dressed in all clothes which a gang member would wear and a toy gun being fired towards the camera. The purpose of this in the music video is to show the influence adults have on children from the way they dress to the there actions e.g. firing the fake gun.

The camera then follows through down the street keeping focus on the path way where there are many of the youth either standing on the side of the wall or plating chase while their is graffiti in the background and also rubbish being  windblown down the abused street. The youngsters leaning on he wall and the middle aged man leaning on the wooden electric pole all look quite shady as the mid aged man is looking in the direction of the teens and the teens are all look like they are waiting for something in which could either be a drug deal going on or something more serious. The graffiti scattered all across the walls and the rubbish laying all down the side of the road shows that in this part of LA life their is not a pleasant place to be as it looks like society has given up trying to care for the community and instead have let all the carnage happen in front of them.

Once the camera rotates round the corner it focuses on the vocalist/ actor Shara Nelson walking down the street only focusing on where she is walking instead of the discombobulated scenes taken place around her as if its an everyday thing. Throughout the whole video from when the vocalist has been caught in the frame (0.25) to the end she does not look upon any of the strange actions taken place for example when the no legged man on a skateboard pushing himself with his arms goes past Nelson she does not look upon him and instead carries on looking and walking forward while singing. The reason behind this act she is perceiving is because Massive Attack is to get the message to the public that these acts in these kinds of societies is normal due to the cities like LA are corrupt with violence and poverty everyday so all the poor people we see roaming the streets in our everyday society in which we look down upon as if they are not human. In the kinds of societies we see which have a rough background the poor are the 'normal' ones and the rich people are the ones that get looked down upon as they are outnumbered.

The skateboarder with no legs has a large reasoning behind it also.
At 1.16 in the music video the man with no legs casually pushes himself on a skateboard down the pathway. the purpose of this to be included in this video is to show how the healthcare in America is extremely poor as they have to pay for everything where as in the UK the NHS takes care of our health. In this part of LA a high amount of the community are drowning in poverty.This indicates that they can not afford to pay healthcare like the no legged man couldn't meaning he can not afford prosthetic limbs for him to walk again in which case is why he is using a skateboard as a use of transport. Moe examples of the poverty is the high amount of vagabonds on the sides of the pathways with one standing still all deluded with all of her property in a shopping trolley and two others standing outside of a corner shop drinking alcoholic substances in a recycled paper bag as it is illegal to drink outside in a public place where it can be seen.
in the background at 3:10 a native American is casually standing at the side of the pathway but is looking out of place due to him being the only native their. The reason behind this is due to the history of the native Americans vs the Western Americans at the time when the Americans wanted to take away the Natives land and buffalo while slaughtering them only for their selfish needs. Massive attack purposefully placed this character in the background to spread the message that the places what are neglected from the rest of the country are the only places that accept the neglected people due to them understanding what its like to be looked down and frowned upon either because of there background, ethnicity, issues or just the way they look.
in conclusion the music video to unfinished sympathy is used to betray how society is corrupt in America due to the high amount of capitalist vs socialism due to the more wealthy states like Washington looking down upon the less unfortunate whom do not have that much money as if they are a disease.