A deep dive into Portishead – Dummy (1994)

Nialler9

This month's deep dive Listen Closely album is:

Portishead - Dummy (1994)

The debut album from the Bristol trio of Geoff Barrow, Beth Gibbons, and Adrian Utley was released during the summer of Blur’s Parklife and Oasis’s Definitely Maybe. Dummy was a darker, stranger record that would become a trip-hop classic that paired hip-hop, jazz, and electronic textures with Beth Gibbons spine-tingling voice and twangy tremolo guitars that belong in spy movies.

The winner of the 1995 Mercury Music Prize, Dummy features the singles ‘Sour Times’, ‘Glory Box’, and ‘Numb’, and is notable for it soulful turntable-sampling, melancholic film noir atmosphere. A modern classic indeed. We delve deep into how the band met, what trip-hop and the Bristol sound was, how the band got their name, how Dummy became hugely popular and a bit of a dinner-party LP ripe for sexy background music in film and more.

The hosts of the Nialler9 Podcast (Niall Byrne and Andrea Cleary) present the Listen Closely series of listening parties on the Big Romance’s warm Toby Hatchett soundsystem, featuring a focus modern classic album and a chat around it on the last Wednesday of the month.

The Portishead - Dummy Listening Party happens Wednesday March 27th at The Big Romance.

Thanks to Georgia Hallion for editing the podcast.

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Show notes

• Songs played on the Nialler9 Podcast Spotify Playlist
• KEXP 25 year anniversary interview in 2019
• Dummy Samples
• Pitchfork’s review by By Philip Sherburne

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