Against the Occupy backdrop, you’d almost think the vastly politicized Massive Attack were on hand to provide the most apt trip-hop soundtrack for the current zeitgeist. Memories of their American trek last year are still fresh, reanimated with the band's seething audio-visual assault on capitalism and corporate greed. Similarly, their social-media presence is prevalent and timely, and features sharp critique and commentary.
By contrast, Portishead seem frail in stature, and could be easily perceived as lacking in the arsenal and verve to provide a reasonable political—or even sonic —presence to accompany social unrest. This perception is compounded by singer/”front” person Beth Gibbons, whose poor posture and wallflower stance is far from anyone fronting or standing up to be counted.
Portishead's album release and tour schedule also conveys a distinct lack of urgency: three albums in 15 years; 12 years between the last two albums; 14 years between visits to Vancouver; and even now in 2011 they are finally getting around to tour in support of their 2008 album, Third.
Yet live these purveyors of narcoleptic beats outpaced the somnolence and cut through the shadow-play to touch the couple thousand in attendance by evoking universal themes like fear, loneliness, love, loss, and perseverance.
Oxymoronically, the band's introspection and introversion was hypnotically captivating once bathed in the limelight. The opening triptych mirrored Third’s first three songs— “Silence,” “Hunter,” and “Nylon Smile”—and despite trance-inducing drones and drums, they collectively jarred when necessary to bring the audience's focus transcendentally back to the stage.
This sonic transgression was just one of the many strategies deployed through the night. The rapid-fire “Machine Gun” took a different approach by unrelentingly building up tension and momentum to a boiling point, then stopping abruptly without denouement or resolution. Alternatively, 2009’s Amnesty International charity single “Chasing the Tear” channeled a Kraftwerk vibe, and in homage to the electro-pioneers, it took the audience on a tour with its driving sequencers and bassline. The result was sublime and rapturous.
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