Massive Attack: ‘Colston’s legacy has harmed Bristol’s international reputation’

Massive Attack have criticised both of Bristol’s elected mayors for not using their mandate to remove the statue of Edward Colston nor more quickly change the name of the music venue which once bore his name.

The band also revealed that George Ferguson promised to rename Colston Hall if they supported his candidacy.

Massive Attack refused to play in the venue now called the Bristol Beacon while it was named after the notorious slave trader.

Colston’s statue was toppled on June 7 2020 – photo: Martin Booth

In a Twitter thread, Massive Attack said that Bristol has had a long “failure to reconcile the barbarism of its past”, with the city still “riven with racial inequality”.

Without naming them, Massive Attack criticised the Society of Merchant Venturers, calling them a “shadow body with direct connections to the Atlantic slave trade”.

Ferguson, the first directly elected mayor of Bristol, is a former member of the Merchant Venturers, who until only around five years ago kept Colston’s fingernails and hair at their Clifton headquarters.

A demonstration took place outside Merchants Hall the day before the beginning of the Colston 4 trial – photo: Rob Browne

In the Twitter thread, Massive Attack wrote: “Current debate in Bristol is understandably focused on the trial of the #colston4, but more generally, its vital to understand the underpinning current of political intransigence itself, that made direct action inevitable …

“Bristol’s failure to reconcile the barbarism of its past sits in stark contrast to Liverpool, a city with a similarly stained history, but where the International Slavery Museum proudly stands & no shadow body with direct connections to the Atlantic slave trade still operates…

“As a ‘unified city’ Liverpool’s 2008 European Capital of Culture award (for which Bristol also competed) transformed that city; drawing 7m visitors/generating £753m for the economy. The cost to Bristol’s public realm of the failure to reconcile our history is very real.

“Over 80 years, consecutive city councils and 2 directly elected Mayors failed to remove the Colston offences. The first elected mayor (independent) planned to sit as a member of the SMV’s, an anomaly we challenged via open letter. The 2nd (Labour) chose to deprioritise the issue.

“The 1st Mayor promised to rename Colston Hall if we supported his candidacy. That renaming + the physical removal of signage finally occurred 8 yrs later: after the Colston statue was removed -4 yrs after the 1st Mayor departed office, & 4 yrs since the incumbent had taken office

“As artistic representatives of the city internationally, we’ve experienced & understood the harm Colston’s legacy has done to Bristol’s reputation overseas, & we could not explain or understand a contradiction of power that allowed for major changes to housing, infrastructure & economic policy, but powerlessness to redress the Colston offences.

“We also understand the damage caused within the city itself by the intransigence around the Colston identities, & how these totems of colonial violence & their systemic associations could still play a role in consolidating racial injustice, in a city riven with racial inequality.”

Main photo: Graham Brown

Read more: Massive Attack among Bristol collective spearheading project to support arts sector

Listen to the latest Bristol24/7 Behind the Headlines podcast: