Portisheads

As much as I'm inclined to rail against the annoyingness of Myspace and the very concept of "social networking", I can't deny that Myspace has led me to some very good songs on more than one occasion. But while I won't deny that it's helped to foster a greater openness for bands to post new songs for their fans, which is undeniably good, I stand behind my stance that it's easily the most irritating possible venue for doing so.

Anyway, these two songs are by Amber and Josh from Black Mountain who seem be be challenging the Pink Mountaintops as the best Black Mountain side project. I found them on their Myspace page which you can take a look at here, if you're into that sort of thing.

Amber and Josh - Breathe
Amber and Josh - Take Me Back

I've been thinking a lot lately about Portishead: in part wondering when they'll finally put out a new album but moreso reflecting on how nobody has even come close to matching what they did so unbelievably well on their self titled album (and to a lesser extent on their debut, Dummy). My uninformed contention is that, better than anyone else before or since, they adapted blues and soul music to the possibilities of electronic and sample based instrumentation. But they were doing something else, as well. The above two songs immediately made me think of Portishead because they capture the sort of understated depth that makes Portishead's songs so affecting. In both songs, simple and repetitive keyboard, guitar or bass lines provide the texture around which Amber's voice weaves much more complex and rich melodies. But beneath it all, there's plenty of space: quiet moments in which the listener is able to let the vocals and instruments resonate. Perhaps even more than a Portishead song, though, the spareness of the sound in both of these songs gives them the kind of immediacy that is characteristic of my favourite blues recordings.

*****

But Portishead was about more that just the blues (in the loose sense in which I'm talking about the genre). If Amber and Josh are the understated blues end of the Portishead spectrum, these next two songs represent the other more bombastic soul singer that Beth Gibbons sometimes channels.

Bettye Lavette - Let Me Down Easy
Bettye Lavette - You'll Never Change

The same feelings of lost love, betrayal and loneliness that Amber is singing so delicately about are transformed into powerful, sexually charged and a little bit angry equivalents in Bettye Lavette's able hands. I have so little experience with this genre of music that all I can say is that these two songs make me want to devote the next two months to amassing a collection of motown and soul records.
[Bettye Lavette at Anti Records]