Portishead

The band titled Portishead was formed by Geoff Barrow in 1991, and named in the honor of his hometown, a port near Bristol. Before the formation of this trip-hop command Barrow was a DJ, producer and tape operator. He worked with Massive Attack, Tricky, made remixes for Primal Scream and Depeche Mode. Soloist Beth Gibbons sang in pubs, while guitarist Adrian Utley played for Big John Patton and The Jazz Messengers. The band shot a short film To Kill A Dead Man before finishing the work over their first disc. In 1994, they released their forceful debut Dummy, which fascinated the listeners with its slow, mesmerizing trip-hop beats and the mixture of acid jazz with house. Stylish and dark singles Numb and Sour Times attracted the attention of masses to the creativity of Portishead - this played a big role in the popularization of trip-hop both in the UK and in the USA.

Barrow and Gibbons were shy with the press, so their label Island Records worked out a brilliant marketing strategy for their debut – atmospheric videos for the Dummy tracks spoke colorfully for the Portishead members. In July 1995, the band won the prestigious Mercury Music Prize for The Album Of The Year, successfully competing such stars as Pulp, Oasis, Blur and Suede. After such a powerful start, the trio disappeared for three years in order to come back with the new creation Portishead. Released in 1997, the album differed from Dummy in the terms of music – the major part of the material was written by the band members themselves instead of sampling, the sound progressed in a grinder, sharper form. The audience remembered this work for the singles Cowboys, Over and All Mine. In 1998, Portishead released the live record Roseland NYC Live from their concert in New York, on which the songs of the band can be heard in a whimsical strings arrangement.

After the Roseland NYC Live release, the band disappeared from the scene for several years again. During that time, the Portishead members concentrated on their solo projects and personal business. They appeared together only in 2005, in Bristol at the Tsunami Benefit Concert. Around the same time, Barrow announced that Portishead was working over the third studio album. In August 2006, the band recorded the cover for Un Jour Comme Un Autre (Requiem For Anna) by Serge Gainsbourg for the tribute album Monsieur Gainsbourg: Revisited. In December 2007, the band led the festival All Tomorrow's Parties in Minehead, England. The group played several compositions from their future disc. In January 2008, Portishead announced the beginning of the support tour for the next album. The third long-anticipated work is titled Third and contains eleven amazing tracks in the recognizable band's stylistics.