5 posts tagged “portishead”

I really like Portishead's song, "We Carry On", from their album, Third. I have been listening to the album a lot more lately, especially when I have to drive to San Antonio for my job. Anyway, the sound of the song makes me think of a train (that ongoing, repetitive beat or sound effect or whatever you call it).

I was trying to think of a movie with a train scene in it. At first I thought of Alfred Hitchcock's "Strangers on a Train", but I thought the movements would be too slow for the song. Then, I remembered the scene from the James Bond movie, "To Russia With Love", where the bad guy opens up the wrong briefcase. I watched every Bond movie that would come on TV with my dad growing up so it's easy to recall scenes sometimes. I thought that scene could go with the song so here it is ...

YouTube lets you upload a close-captioned file for a video now, but I don't know how to make one of those. I am sure there is a program I could donwload to do it. I would like to add captions for what they are saying, mixed with captions of the song lyrics. That would be cool.

The above video is from Radiohead's blog.

Here is the original song by Portishead.

I love it when an artist I really like is a fan of another artist I really like (or something like that).  

OK, there are three songs on Portishead's new album, Third, that make me think of others songs.

The first song is "Hunter", which makes me think of a song from the 1992 horror movie, Candyman, by Philip Glass called "Face to Razor".

Here are the two songs ...

I saw some photos of Gillian Anderson in Maxim on one of those entertainment shows like Entertainment Tonight or something like that. I actually can't remember which one it was. Anyway, she looks amazing in the photos, and I really liked her character, Scully, on X-Files who tried to be rational and skeptical even when aliens were all around her (she kind of caved in later in the series). Anyway, here are the photos with some cool Portishead songs to go with them.

 

Portishead came out with the album, "Dummy", a long, long time ago. It had that great song, "Sour Times (Nobody Loves Me)", that would go ... "Nobody loves me  ... it's true ... not like you do". Their sound was called "trip hop", a phrase I love. Other artists who have dabbled in trip hop include Tricky, Massive Attack, Bjork, Tori Amos, PJ Harvey, The Cardigans, and even Madonna (see "Candy Perfume Girl"). Some people use other terms, such as "down tempo", to describe "trip hop" music, but I like to just say "trip hop" and nothing else.

The album, Dummy, had a great trippy song called "Wandering Star". Here it is ...

In 1997, a much better album by Portishead came out. The album was just called "Portishead", and every song on it was (and is) a gem. I can't really think of my favorite song on the album. The first song on it, "Cowboys", sets the tone for the entire album with a very creepy sound, but I think "Over" is my favorite song on the album. Like the album's artwork, the sound of the album is very dark. More albums like this one should be made.

Portishead - Cowboys

Portishead - Over

Here is a really cool video of Portishead's "Only You" that was directed by Chris Cunningham who did other cool videos like Aphex Twin's "Come To Daddy" and Madonna's "Frozen".

There is a site called Fuzz that allows you to upload "mixtapes" for others to listen to. I uploaded a section of a continuous mix that Soulwax aka Radio Soulwax aka 2 Many Djs did. The mix includes Portishead's song, "Glory Box". Here is the mix or "mixtape" ...

  Anyway, back to the original question ... When is Portishead going to put out another brilliant album? Music is fine right now, but I think a new Portishead album could "up the ante", so to speak.