This is the best album ever that I never feel like listening to (one of my college housemates did play it 3 times a week for 2 years tho).
― nashwan, Saturday, 29 June 2019 08:46 (four years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.
― System, Tuesday, 23 July 2019 00:01 (four years ago) link
voted only you bc the roseland set makes it the first one that comes to mind
― j., Tuesday, 23 July 2019 00:46 (four years ago) link
"elysium", groundlessness & the edge of overflow occupying the same shape
― lowercase (eric), Tuesday, 23 July 2019 00:56 (four years ago) link
Controp that "Cowboys" is not good, dwarfed by the superior "All Mine" that attempts the same height and exceeds it
Love "Over", love watching Roseland NYC and seeing that Geoff Barrow is excellent at "decks"!
I argue that this is the worst Portishead album, too "spy movie", not enough genuine suffering
I'd vote "Half Day Closing" for that crazy vocal moment, but that's not what this album is really about, this album is about pastiche, and "All Mine" is the most successful example of that, so I voted for "All Mine"
― flamboyant goon tie included, Tuesday, 23 July 2019 06:01 (four years ago) link
Half day closing was one of the first songs I learned on bass so that one.
― ✖✖✖ (Moka), Tuesday, 23 July 2019 08:13 (four years ago) link
Only You (more understated than the other singles + better chorus)
― change display name (Jordan), Tuesday, 23 July 2019 14:26 (four years ago) link
you know what? i never really got on with Portishead save for a couple of songs (Glory Box, The Rip). That's sacrilege where I'm from.
― frame casual (dog latin), Tuesday, 23 July 2019 15:10 (four years ago) link
I too like them better in theory than on practice. I have all their albums but very rarely feel like listening.
― ✖✖✖ (Moka), Tuesday, 23 July 2019 16:55 (four years ago) link
Half Day Closing is one of those songs where I can remember the first time I heard it, and it seemed enticingly alien. But it's textured and weary like Happiness is a Warm Gun. That whole familiar + new thing.
― bendy, Tuesday, 23 July 2019 17:11 (four years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.
― System, Wednesday, 24 July 2019 00:01 (four years ago) link
Aw I really like Undenied and Western Eyes (think I forgot to vote though).
― chap, Wednesday, 24 July 2019 09:39 (four years ago) link
somehow i never really listened to this album. and dummy totally knocked me out. all mine is much brighter than anything on dummy. only you starts like a gimmick with that trickery imitating duck noises. and it isn't very somber neither. this definitely misses a kind of profoundness i feel. half day closing does not work for me on first listen. she is trying too hard on that one.
― je est un autre, l'enfer c'est les autres (alex in mainhattan), Saturday, 10 August 2019 21:01 (four years ago) link
duck noises??????!?!?!?
― j., Sunday, 11 August 2019 00:19 (four years ago) link
https://www.thespruce.com/thmb/OZMhZeQtehT_XQrrP2kfoJqV_Nk=/960x0/filters:no_upscale():max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/duck-big-bill-59ef8e5068e1a2001072c89e.jpg
― j., Sunday, 11 August 2019 00:21 (four years ago) link
i think it is a kind of scratching which creates that high-pitch sound which has got a similarity to duck chatter i find. this sound is almost a trademark of portishead, they use a similar sound at the beginning of mysterons which is even more duck like.
― je est un autre, l'enfer c'est les autres (alex in mainhattan), Sunday, 11 August 2019 11:59 (four years ago) link
That's the one
― Mark G, Sunday, 11 August 2019 12:04 (four years ago) link
How prescient of them:
https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/local-news/portishead-ducks-swans-wallowing-mud-1844328
― pomenitul, Sunday, 11 August 2019 14:09 (four years ago) link
Only You is pretty darn sombre.
― chap, Sunday, 11 August 2019 15:28 (four years ago) link
Didn't see the poll, would've voted "Over". Never knew people thought the record was bad. Loved it when it came out and still do. I thought it was darker than Dummy.
― LeRooLeRoo, Monday, 12 August 2019 21:04 (four years ago) link
I was a huge fan of the first album at the time and didn't care for this one immediately upon release. I was disappointed right away, and despite buying the LP, CD, and 2 different 12"s from this album, I never really played it much. Possible issues: too long between albums with very little variance in sound - lots of things sounded like a retread, there were loads of imitators who released music between the two albums, the songs just aren't as good.
― brotherlovesdub, Monday, 12 August 2019 22:32 (four years ago) link
I don't know why this album gets so much flack, it rules. Also I think the first two records have come around from being 'dated' (very evocative of their time and place, overplayed, lots of imitators) to sounding prescient & not dated at all.
It also seems overly simplistic to cast the first album as sample-based and this one as not...Dummy had more samples, but still had a ton of live instrumentation that was very creatively resampled & processed (same as the s/t).
― Jordan s/t (Jordan), Wednesday, 8 November 2023 16:24 (five months ago) link
this album gets flak?? it completely rules, an outstanding not even slightly disappointing second album. so many great tunes, “only you”, “mourning air”, “half day closing”, “all mine” ffs. dummy had more synthetic sounds, like the drum machine on “it could be sweet”, this leans into the John Barry shit hard.
― brimstead, Wednesday, 8 November 2023 16:37 (five months ago) link
there's like two posts slamming the album just within the last bump
― ivy., Wednesday, 8 November 2023 16:39 (five months ago) link
This is the first album I go to when I want to listen to Portishead. I really never got why it was generally considered to be worse than the other 2.
― silverfish, Wednesday, 8 November 2023 16:44 (five months ago) link
1. Portishead2. Third3. Dummy
Is how I would rank them, which I guess is the opposite of most people
― silverfish, Wednesday, 8 November 2023 16:45 (five months ago) link
it was the eighth of november in the year of our lord two thousand twenty three when i first discovered there are assholes who thought the second portishead album was disappointing. it was a sunny day and i had an extra cup of coffee.
(the b-sides from this album are fab, btw)
― "another slice of death, please." (Austin), Wednesday, 8 November 2023 16:50 (five months ago) link
it was the eighth of november in the year of our lord two thousand twenty three when i first discovered there are assholes who thought the second portishead album was disappointingmy friend, it appears that like me you missed that there were like two posts in this thread in the year 2019 expressing disappointment with the second portishead album, we are completely out of the damn loop
― brimstead, Wednesday, 8 November 2023 17:49 (five months ago) link
nb that is a totally silly post, <3 austin and ivy
― brimstead, Wednesday, 8 November 2023 17:50 (five months ago) link
this album rules, i probably listened to it ten times as much as dummy (which i love), but this one hit at just the right time. idk why but its to me reminiscent of the move cypress hill made from the s/t to black sunday. a darker refinement of the earlier album, with a bleaker, dirtier sound, even more paranoid and more down in the depths than the previous work (which in both cases was already down there.)
― omar little, Wednesday, 8 November 2023 17:54 (five months ago) link
Tbf I also was looking at *other* old ILM threads.
Portishead - are we fickle or did they deserve to become dated so quickly?
― Jordan s/t (Jordan), Wednesday, 8 November 2023 17:59 (five months ago) link
Also I think I didn't really distinguish between the first two albums because I got into the live album first and worked backwards
― Jordan s/t (Jordan), Wednesday, 8 November 2023 18:00 (five months ago) link
Adrian Utley is auctioning off his Portishead live rig Moog to support Gaza. I assume there will be two extra zeroes over what I could pay but that would be a cool thing to have (and very cool of AU).
― papal hotwife (milo z), Wednesday, 8 November 2023 18:19 (five months ago) link
I would also rank them Portishead -> Third -> Dummy, with Third nearly being a tie. Actually felt this was a fairly common take, but I suppose not...
I thought they were okay until I heard Only You and the rest of that album. It's a masterpiece.
― octobeard, Wednesday, 8 November 2023 18:53 (five months ago) link
Third nearly being a tie for first I meant to say
― octobeard, Wednesday, 8 November 2023 18:54 (five months ago) link
Does anyone else hear in “Elysium” that the background loop, which seems like typical LP crackle, is actually a distorted male voice muttering, “I’m dirty, I’m dirty, I am dirty, I’m dirty”, etc.?
― Halfway there but for you, Friday, 10 November 2023 04:08 (five months ago) link
I think Portishead are like numerous 00s indie bands in that the debut will always be the canon, totem choice and also the one I find will probably always find least interesting. Portishead is so clearly a total improvement in every way imo, and Third is my favourite but ofc clearly something else altogether.
― you can see me from westbury white horse, Friday, 10 November 2023 04:38 (five months ago) link
Anyway, despite the heavy debt to “The American Metaphysical Circus”, I’d have picked “Half Day Closing” for two reasons: the awesomely crummy-sounding guitar that comes in on the second chorus, and a vocal that rivals Annisette or Dagmar Krause in its combination of bereft misery and destructive rage.
― Halfway there but for you, Friday, 10 November 2023 04:40 (five months ago) link
I’m terms of comparing the albums, I think they’re fairly equal: three or four great songs, four or five good songs, two or three failed experiments or dreary exercises apiece.
― Halfway there but for you, Friday, 10 November 2023 04:47 (five months ago) link
always enjoy Adrian Utley talking about making music
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zlv9i0XC8NA
― papal hotwife (milo z), Saturday, 25 November 2023 08:07 (four months ago) link