Product Description

Imaginatively-titled third studio album from illustrious Bristolians whose 1994 debut "Dummy" broke trip-hop all over the world with its artful, haunting and melancholy fusion of torch song, sinister atmospherics and slowed-down hip-hop beats. Coming a full ten years after their last album, the live document 'PNYC', this record sees them going back to the source, digging in the crates for weird and wonderful samplesfrom prog rock, free jazz, techno, industrial and funk on which to work their twisted magic, as well as incorporating some of the folk influence that pervades frontwoman Beth Gibbons' solo work.

Track Listing

1. Silence
2. Hunter
3. Nylon Smile
4. The Rip
5. Plastic
6. We Carry On
7. Deep Water
8. Machine Gun
9. Small
10. Magic Doors
11. Threads

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2 in Music
• Released on: 2008-04-28
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 49 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Portishead's Third has been a long time coming, the result of a lengthy creative topor following 1997's dark, distinctly underrated album Portishead. Importantly, though, they've shaken it. While the core trio of Beth Gibbons, Geoff Barrow, and Adrian Utley remains, this is quite a different band to Portishead's 90s incarnation: gone is the slo-mo turntable scratching and smoky jazz feel, replaced by heavy, brooding rhythms, vintage-sounding electronics, and spindly guitar. Still present, though, is that sense of emotional fracture and deep gloom. "Silence" opens with a dense drum loop which suddenly falls away to reveal Gibbons' voice, cold but magnificent: "Wounded and afraid, inside my head/Falling through changes". "Nylon Smile", meanwhile, is a fine example of Third's occasional folksy edge, an acoustic song reminiscent of Leonard Cohen that, around its midpoint, lifts off on a propulsive electronic rhythm, Gibbons holding one clear, hard note as synthesisers bubble beneath. At times, it's a harsh and foreboding listen: the electronic drums of "Machine Gun" might put off the listener hoping for smooth dinner party fare. But Third is a brave and forward-thinking return, and one great enough to justify its lengthy gestation. --Louis Pattison

Customer Reviews

Well worth the wait.
This will be no long rant. Buy this album and keep playing it. After a few spins you won't be able to turn it off. In a word, brilliant.

The very definition of the word 'grower'
When I first spun up this album I have to admit I was disappointed. After such a long gap, thoughts of a radical change of direction are furthest from the listener's mind- we just want to be back in that student bedroom in 1997 listening to "Elysium" whilst we get stoned out of our minds with our campus buddy. And I fell into this trap instantly.

After hearing "Machine Gun" I was intrigued enough to want to recreate the 90s by being able to sit down and listen to a new Portishead album. That was an experience in itself.

"What is this?!?" I asked myself- and you should know I'm no stranger to disjointed 'uncomfortable' music, being a fan of the likes of Autechre, Aphex, Joy Division, Zappa- and I felt a little disappointed. I assigned it 3 stars in my head, but thought I was being generous. I found it even more paranoid, fractured and the soundtrack to the bleakness going on in Gibbons' tortured mind than their last one- and whilst I was in awe of this, I wasn't getting that so bleak it lifts you up vibe at all.

But I persisted, and on about the third listen it came alive. In horribly vivid black and white, like Bergman on acid. There it all was: the unmistakable Portishead sound- buried, certainly, but it was there under the rubble; this was Portishead in the 21st century- the Dark in the darkest of times; the suffering of man, the encroaching paranoia; the suffocating hopelessness that threatens to engulf us all if we let it; but also there is fight, there is anger- this is a militant record.

A more uncomfortable and yet rewarding listening experience cannot be found at the moment. It is this paradox that makes "Third" a serious contender for album of the year already, and perhaps the most successful 'comeback album' of any band in the last couple of decades, arguably.

My favourite tracks are "Silence", "The Rip", "Plastic"; "Machine Gun" and "Magic Doors".

If you want something to put on whilst you and your wife entertain your friends, this is not it. If you want something that sums up the times, leaves you a little disturbed and exhilarated, then THIS IS IT.

Half a star deducted for the slightly-too-quirky/irrelevant "Deep Water". So I'm really giving it 4.5, even though I can't on Amazon.

lifeless and dull
Loved Portishead since they released their first album , but this new release, after an 11 year wait, is the biggest disappointment I've heard. You can say they're being "experimental" not relying on tried and tested sounds but this album sounds cheaply and quickly produced. I've heard better productions on home demoes on Myspace and there are thousands of them out there. The sounds are the mainstay of bad electronica easy to produce on synthesisers but " it gives that cold, disjointed ,disillusioned with life etc etc" yeah yeah! getting a good sound on an analogue synth can be difficult ,I know I own two. Listen to Skinny Puppy and you can hear dystopia and they make it sound amazing . Listening to them in the 80's and you be amazed how fresh it sounds.They still sound amazing today and don't wait 11 years to make an album.
Third's songs are dull never minding the sound. They are like listening to a constant whinge. NME probably loved it but to me it sounds like a band having to produce product quickly or the record company will drop them them because they have been doing bugger all for over a decade!