Beth Gibbons & Rustin' Man - Out Of Season

And jason's right about 'Romance' sounding like Billie Holliday, but I like the fact that she's happy to pastiche different vocal styles and play around with things vocally. It's one of the things that really distinguishes it from a Portishead record.

As I tried -- fairly awkwardly -- to say in this update last year. Apologies in advance for that cliché in the final sentence, but I really wanted (and still want) more people to hear this album. Anyone who hears MOR/AOR on Out of Season isn't listening past the first layer.

Forget Zero 7 / Lemon Jelly / Sia / Susannah + Magic Orchestra etc etc - all that female-fronted chill-out shit really is as bad as you think, but this is something very different and very special, in my ears.

I think it's up there with anything by Portishead and Talk Talk, which is no meat feat, eh.

The rest of it, beyond "tom the model", I don't remember. I've played the first song a lot, and the rest very infrequently. Also, most of it feels like an Autumn album, so its erm...out of season.. at the moment.

I was thinking about this album earlier, actually. About time it had another play.

Is it the drizzle and the damp, do you think?

Fantastic album. I think "mysteries" is still my favourite song of the 00s so far.

When I heard Portishead were working on a new album, my first thought was that I'd much rather hear a new Gibbons solo album.

Then "Candy Says" cover sucks, though.

so today i dug this out along with the Mark Hollis album.
did the all important ILM search only to find that I am not alone in putting these 2 albums together.
i suspect that out of season is going to get a lot of love during this week of late shifts.

I just bought this over the weekend! It sounded great last night.

this is where i admit that i only just bought the old portishead albums last week.

Amazing how people can buy albums which aren't out for another four weeks.

Amazing how people lack basic reading comprehension.

maracas.jpg

To be honest that was a gaffe and a haffe.

Dingbod Gaffney's Gaffes.

The James Yorkston/Rustin Man album of a year or two ago is pretty good too. Again, a similar Talk Talk-ish feel.

I love this record but, for me, it's not a Spring or Summer record. It's a bit out of season for this. This is a classic late Autumn record. A chill in the air, a sweater, some crunchy leaves, etc.

exactly, I first heard this in November, in London, and nothing could be more perfect

I love this record. Anybody knows where to find a vinyl copy of it? Or has a spare copy I could get you rid of?

what a great album.
genuine shiver-up-the-spine moments throughout.

New solo album forthcoming:

http://pitchfork.com/news/51147-portisheads-beth-gibbons-to-release-new-solo-album-on-domino/

let's hope for harris/webb involvement!

psyyyyched

Great news! Probably means the Portishead album is still another five years away but hey, she hasn't an album that's less than great so hopefully this one will be too.

Apparently Billy Gibbons is taking her place in Rustin Man.

Could be challops but 'Out of Season' has more replay value for me than any Portishead album.

i agree, and i'm v much looking forward to the new one

i'm with moka re 'out of season'

also yes if I heard this out somewhere I would have assumed it was a Robert Wyatt album I'd never heard before. Finally gave the whole thing a listen, excellent.

I'd love to know what's prompted him to record another album at this point. Perhaps Bowie and the thought of his own morality.

'The World's In Town' is still so new, but such an amazing song. . . it doesn't even seem real at this point.

from what I can glean he has been making the album for many years and he wanted to play most parts himself so learned a lot of instruments well enough to be able to play them and recorded the requisite parts over a long period of time then assembled and mixed them into tracks.

here it is

"Apparently he wanted to learn the assorted instruments he plays on it well enough to be comfortable recording himself, and had to build up the arrangements as his capabilities increased. Each instrument’s contribution to the album was recorded in turn, rather than track by track"

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/feb/01/rustin-man-drift-code-review

Ah so Lee Harris plays on there!

“Robert Wyatt sings Blackstar” is eerily spot-on. It’s actually a bit distracting at first, like when you watch Christian Slater and it takes a few minutes to spot Christian Slater behind the guy practicing his Nicholson impression in the bathroom mirror.

That said I love the shit out of this

Anyone heard Beth Gibbons & The Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra - Henryk Górecki: Symphony No. 3 (Symphony Of Sorrowful Songs)?

cOMES OUT ON fRIDAY, i THINK. mY COPY IS ALLegedly in the post, sorry caps lock falure.

Possible I'm being a dick but the Youtube "teaser" didn't really, um, tease enough to prompt a purchase.

whoa this record

the new rustin man i mean, though out of season rules

its amazing that he was learning all to play all the instruments on this album as he made it

This is definitely one of the best folk records ever recorded, but somehow it slipped under my radar untill recently.

Drift Code has been growing on me gradually over the last year, at the moment I'm listening to little else.

drift code would be nice if he would not sing. his voice really sounds like an old man without any teeth left. it reminds me of robert wyatt but i love wyatt's voice. the main difference being that webb's voice is about two octaves lower and so absolutely unmusical. just terrible. besides that a fine album for sure.

One hell of a "besides"..

I listen to Out of Season all the time.

I like him, he sounds like David Bowie combined with Edward Ka-Spel

One hell of a "besides"..

― nostormo,

lol, right?

I'm actually laughing like fuck at that post and your response.

Yeah, classic excelsior

I love his voice. "Drift Code" is easily the best album of the year for me.

I don't love his voice, but there's definitely some interesting tension between the big pop moments on this record--like, say, the chorus of Our Tomorrows, or the climax of The World's in Town--and the vehicle chosen to deliver those payoff moments, which plays a large part of what makes the album memorable for me

This hasn't really clicked for me until today. The Wyatt thing is clear but, if anything, it reminds me of a muted Super Furries or even Gorky's.

It took a while to make the first album, the second one seems to have come about a lot quicker: Clockdust, to be released in March!

Das Triadische Ballett on the cover! A very encouraging sign even if this is Bethless.

Great news! Live dates too

Listening to the new album now, feels more restrained but more confident than Drift Codes. Voice perhaps a bit stronger.

Clockdust has proved to be a lockdown staple for me, I prefer it to Drfit Code. Also being listening a lot to the first Orang album which has recently appeared on Spotify (or maybe I just couldn't find it before - Orang is not the most searchable name). Beth Gibbons appears on it, pre-Portishead (I think).

completely missed that coming out, so looking forward to giving it a listen.

sheesh, i completely missed it too.

finally getting to this. even on first impression, i have to agree with fetter: it feels more immediately unified and reassured than drift code — and i thought that album was fantastic. however, clockdust definitely seems like it's of a part with drift code; like he's been making these orchestral, vaguely folky recordings in private for the past two decades or so and what's on these albums is just what he's chosen to let the rest of the world hear. and who knows how many more of these easily digestible, endlessly rewarding fourty minute albums he seems to just have laying around, waiting to be assembled.

it's very comfortable music that is simultaneously mystifying in the most charming way.

thanks for the revive, fetter. probably would have passed me by otherwise.

also "night in evening city" is absolutely perfect.

after a few listens, i simultaneously love and hate how this ends with the psychedelic buzzing chorus of "man with a remedy." i want there to be something else after the song just falls apart. . . like a short reprise of "rubicon song" or something else that closes the deal more resoundingly. the way it ends as is very much feels like a cliffhanger.

also "night in evening city" is absolutely perfect.

oh yeah, definitely. I've read he was in a "reggae band" before Talk Talk - you can almost hear it here.

I've never heard an artist sound more like another artist (Robert Wyatt, voice obviously, but even melodic approach and overall aesthetic) and yet be SO FANTASTIC. I mean--I think even Mr. Wyatt would have to tip his hat.

I just found out he already has a second album out, so that's the listening docket for the evening. Very excited.

agreed. you'll love clockdust. i like it even more than the first one.

New album on the way, and a lovely first track has already appeared.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldrx0eSqV-E

reminds me of sandy denny.

Good song.