This moment, how can it feel so wrong?

So it turns out that Portishead is releasing a new album, titled "Third" (wow, not so creative huh?). This is kind of a big deal, since they pretty much started the whole 'trip-hop' thing and they haven't released anything significant for the past 10 years or so.

I've been listening to it for the past two days now, and I think that it's gestated in my mind enough for me to give a valid opinion on it.

In one sentence: It's different from their previous work, but it's still Portishead. Clearly, it's been ten years, so they hopefully won't crank out the exact same stuff. That would be kind of sad (like the Red Hot Chili Peppers). However, I can't say that all of the changes are positive. My biggest complaint is that Beth Gibbon's voice sort of gets lost or buried in the instrumentals/sampling. Not to say that you can't hear it; it's just not what you remember after listening to the song. One of the things that I absolutely love about Dummy is that you have this great unique atmosphere created by the effects and instrumentals, but you still have songs that are approachable and memorable. The most obvious example of this is the 8th track of the new album, "Machine Gun." It starts with this really loud drum loop that continues through THE WHOLE TRACK. It overwhelms the entire track, and to a certain extent, then entire album.

Now, don't get me wrong. I love a good loud sample loop. However, Björk did it first, and she did a much better job. Take the song "Innocence" from her last album. That's got the same sort of overwhelming loop that continues from the song, but also, it's got a great melody that's powerful enough to coexist with the sound effects.

Another complaint that I have is that they tried to vary their sound, but I think that they did it in a very superficial way. They got rid of the turntables, which is good because that's a one-time thing. Nobody wants to hear an entire album more of that. They also tried to incorporate different instruments. I even heard ukulele and cowbell (not that cowbell is all that unique, I just never expected Portishead to use it). But I think that their aesthetic is so overpowering that anything that they try to do will sound very similar to their previous music, at least to the casual observer.

I guess this is coming off as very negative. I do really like this album, it's just that I had such high expectations that I couldn't help being let down. I was kind of hoping that they'd do what they did 10 years ago and change the face of music. I guess not.