| Third | 
 enlarge
| List Price: $13.98
Buy New: $5.99
You Save: $7.99 (57%)
Buy New/Used from $5.83
Avg. Customer Rating:   (based on 189 reviews)
Sales Rank: 694
Category: Music
Artist: Portishead
Publisher: Mercury
Studio: Mercury
Manufacturer: Mercury
Label: Mercury
Media: Audio CD
Discs: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 5.6 x 5 x 0.5
MPN: 001114102
UPC: 602517664005
EAN: 0602517664005
ASIN: B0016HNOXQ
Release Date: April 29, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
|
| Tracks:
| • | Silence | | • | Hunter | | • | Nylon Smile | | • | The Rip | | • | Plastic | | • | We Carry On | | • | Deep Water | | • | Machine Gun | | • | Small | | • | Magic Doors | | • | Threads |
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.co.uk
Portishead's Third has been a long time coming, the result of a lengthy creative torpor 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: Read 184 more reviews...
Where to Start and Where to End? June 29, 2009
Where to start? Maybe with the end!!
I've listened to this album all week long, sucking in the sound, trying to find reasons to be critical, reasons to dismiss, reasons to love it, reasons to obsess over it, reasons to dub it the best album of the year, and have come to see that this album should only be heard in context to Portishead's music alone.
Silence and Magic Doors remind me of Martin Hannett's production of ESG.
The use of Philip Glass style arpeggios for minimalist drama is clear in Hunter and full force in The Rip. But listened in whole, the album is most definitely an album only Portishead could make.
My biggest gripe, and this is a huge gripe, are the fade outs of tracks and abrupt ineffective ends to many of the tracks. I even took The Rip and played around with it in Cubase to try and give it an ending that didn't leave me totally annoyed. In some cases, as in Machine Gun the end is perfect! But in most cases it's just weak, especially considering that ALL the tracks on this album are great songs. I don't know, are they trying to implant a great flaw in this so that it won't be an OK Computer of it's day?
I understand expressing self loathing through music and words but implanting it into the structure of an album like this is something I have not experienced and don't know how to deal with.
So, honestly, there are absolutely brilliant songs on here but most of them will leave you hanging in a state of dismay without any closure.
In the end, with Threads, the closure you get to this album is the monolithic whine of a synthesizer, like a machine's final swan song.
DEATH!
A solid follow-up May 16, 2009
After so many years passed, I was expecting when I heard there was a third album that it might be weak. The uninspired name didn't evoke any confidence either.
And while this album isn't quite the match of the previous two, and has a few songs on it that are a bit odd, the album holds together surprisingly well. Individually, some of the songs are good and a few are really good, and collectively, the album holds up better than you'd think, the songs build on each other. This is not an album to be played as individual tracks in a mixed playlist for its best experience, it's an album to play straight through.
 Portishead, Third May 3, 2009
I'm a huge Portishead fan. I love how unique and slightly strange the music is. This CD is more than slightly strange though. Maybe I just need to listen to it moreso it will grow on me, but this CD somehow has a different feel than the other two.
Not an instant classic, but still a fine album. April 28, 2009
It took a few listens for this one to grow on me. Being a fan of their previous releases, I had some high expectations. Was I let down? At first, yes, but over time this one really got into my head. A nice addition to anyone's ambient groove collection.
Pomme
Bold and Dark and Awesome April 25, 2009
If you liked Portishead's previous efforts, you're sure to enjoy this album. It's every bit as dark and tragic as anything they've ever done, yet it's somehow different. I couldn't put my finger on it, but it does sound like they've updated their sound a bit to give it even more texture.
Great mood music as always, but the lyrics are also intense. Recommended.
|
|
|
