Better late then never

I first became a Portishead fan because of my sister. After seeing "Only You," from their second, self-titled CD on MTV late one night, she came home from Strawberries with said CD in hand. After listening for a few days through the thin walls of our dilapidated ranch house, I bought the CD myself. But upon finding their first effort, 1994's Dummy, I declared it to be their better endeavor.

Dummy has a varying feel to it- anywhere from a smoky jazz club to a sad, sultry siren singing her songs in a lounge in Reno, NV. The first track, "Mysterons," begins with a repetitive, trilling drumbeat and a sound effect that is normally associated with the scene where the aliens land in campy sci-fi films. However, the soaring, operatic soprano of vocalist Beth Gibbons soon comes into play, and all is suddenly well. This is only the beginning of Dummy- every track on this CD contains a beautiful and haunting melody. "Sour Times," the single by which most Portishead fans were created, finds Gibbons alternating between a controlled, thin vocal style during the verses, and a heart-rending wail of "Nobody loves meeee" in the chorus. Gibbons seems to stick to one mood -sorrow- throughout the album, but alternates within that mood from mere self pity to utter grief with her vocal style. From yearning ("It Could Be Sweet" and Glory Box") to regret ("Pedestal"), Dummy is wide-ranged in its thematicness. "Glory Box" is the real star of the show, with Gibbons vocals backed by a strings sample of an Isaac Hayes song as she pleads, "Give me a reason to love you/ give me a reason to be a woman." The words tell a tale of obsessive love (whose sinister elements are brought out more effectively in remixes on the Glory Times CD) that contrast sharply with the sweetness of the strings in the background that eventually give way to a slow, pulsating drumbeat as Gibbons croons, "It's time to move over." Overall, Dummy is anything but.