My Top 100 Albums: #79 - Portishead, ‘Dummy’
79.
Portishead, ‘Dummy’
Go! Beat, 1994
Genre-spawning and era-defining, Portishead’s Dummy is a perfect storm of ‘90s musicality. The combination of Geoff Barrow’s tailored hip-hop beats, sophisticated harmonic progressions and astute sampling with Beth Gibbons’ ethereal vocals and meticulous performances would probably resonate in most eras, but in the context of 1994, the album manages to be both revelatory and opportune: popularising the ‘trip-hop’ genre and putting Bristol on the global musical map, whilst making careful use of established techniques from the hip-hop scene and various other styles. Quite how Barrow and Gibbons manage to meld mellow dance grooves with such an omnipresent and imposing sense of dread is as inexplicable to me as the enigmatic opening track Mysterons, a deeply disturbing rebuke that features one of Barrow’s most compelling drum loops and some of Gibbons’ most haunting vocals. This creates a sense of foreboding that is answered unequivocally by the music that follows. Sour Times is faster-paced than the track it follows but is no less unsettling, and features perhaps the album’s most compelling melody. This highlights the element that makes this album truly great: its juxtaposition of a genuinely enjoyable, mainstream musicality with an inherent angst and melancholy, as though the music is in a constant struggle with itself. This is what I mean by a perfect storm - it feels unlikely that any other singer but Beth Gibbons could have navigated this conflict with the emotional sincerity that she achieves on this record. Never does it feel trite or imprecise. Roads, a sublimely beautiful track built on a hypnotising synth progression, has an altogether different emotional impact, with a sort of vulnerability that Gibbons executes impeccably with soft, breathy sighs, a deft application of head voice, and sudden outbursts of dynamism. In contrast, the album ends on the playful and poppy Glory Box, in which Gibbons turns her vocal performance on its head, with an almost mischievous chalky timbre in the verses, and a forceful rock vocal texture on the chorus. The overall effect is forty-five minutes of mesmerising, relentless music that, unfortunately, even Portishead were unable to effectively replicate on later releases. A standout record that is both timely and timeless.
Hidden Highlight: Pedestal
Mysterons
Sour Times
Strangers
It Could be Sweet
Wandering Star
Numb
Roads
Pedestal
Biscuit
Glory Box