Project Description

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Beth Gibbons.

Beth Gibbons

Photo – Ian Laidlaw

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BETH GIBBONS
@ RISING, Hamer Hall,
Melbourne,
1st June, 2025
(Live Review)

Review by Sam Coronado

Photos by Ian Laidlaw

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Beth Gibbons

Photo – Ian Laidlaw

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Kicking off Melbourne’s RISING Festival, albeit a few days earlier than official promotions stated, was English singer Beth Gibbons. Perhaps the most notable international name on the card for RISING this year, Gibbons has featured on tracks by legendary MCs MF DOOM and Kendrick Lamar, and collaborated with Paul Webb, the bassist of English post-rockers Talk Talk.

However, most would be familiar with Gibbons from her work as the vocalist and lyricist of acclaimed Bristol-based Trip-hop collective Portishead. Their famed 1994 debut Dummy is remembered as a landmark of not only its genre, but also of electronic music more broadly, and perhaps even its decade through its haunting, brooding instrumentals, with Gibbons’ forlorn lyrics and gorgeous vocals sitting just above them.

Yes, that Beth Gibbons is now touring Australia with her 2024 full-length solo debut, Lives Outgrown. And it being her first time on our shores as a solo act, a packed-out Hamer Hall was buzzing in their seats and in the wings, even before the lights were dimmed. That debut LP has gone on to receive numerous accolades and acclaim, nominated for the same Mercury prize which Dummy won thirty years ago in 1995. That nomination, and the fact that Gibbons is singing on it, is just about the only thing these releases have in common, however. There is far less sampling, a preference for live, chamber instrumentation, at the expense of the electronic, and the drum loops which were laden throughout Portishead’s catalogue.

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Beth Gibbons

Photo – Ian Laidlaw

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For those partial to the folkier, chamber-music influences strewn throughout her latest release, hearing Gibbons sing these tunes live, her voice as beautiful as ever, and backed by an exceptionally proficient seven-piece band, probably paid back the price of entry and then some. But then again, I suspect there were some, or even many, like me, who while recognising and appreciating the beauty, and the power of her new compositions, are first and foremost fans of Gibbons as the singer of one of the most influential and celebrated electronic acts of our time.

While they are vastly different musicians and artists, when I think about my predicament I can’t help but remember Thom Yorke’s recent solo tour, him being the vocalist and frontman of a band of similar standing and reputation in Radiohead. The feeling at the end of both of those nights in Melbourne was incredibly positive, but I wonder if that might be attributed to the volume of much-loved Radiohead classics and deep cuts that littered the setlist. I wonder if the crowd’s glowing response those nights would have been much the same if, like Gibbons, Yorke had stuck to his more recent solo work, which in his case could have easily manifested in a two-hour experimental-ambient and techno set, far from the alt-rock classics that many would have hoped to hear going in.

I hope you get where I’m going with this. Not to take anything away from Beth’s recent work, but I am quite sure there were many who, like me, cannot detach her gorgeous, melancholic croons from the looped drums, and perfectly layered, angsty instruments that are the perfect soundtrack to driving alone in the middle of the night. This isn’t about making a judgement call about whether her solo material is inferior in any way, just recognising that, as with just about every similar case, the material is just starkly different, and similar responses can’t just be expected.

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Beth Gibbons

Photo – Ian Laidlaw

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Now with that roundabout way of declaring my biases over, lets get into what was a pleasant and pretty memorable evening, all things considered. For the whingers and whiners and Portishead fanboys like me, I would say there was much to not only appreciate, but enjoy about Gibbons’ set. There were plenty of highlights; some were already those I quite liked coming in, such as set closer “Reaching Out”, and lead single “Floating On A Moment”, others were ones I warmed up to, such as “Rewind” and “For Sale”. The former brought some much-needed energy and darkness into the early part of the setlist, shifting the tone with every pedal-heavy distorted note of Eoin Rooney’s electric guitar.

The initially meandering and then soaring strings of the latter, which can be credited to Anisa Arslanagic on violin, take full advantage of the instrument-forward mix, making me wonder how I ever looked past the track on the studio release. I could give a shout to just about anyone else on that stage, with all of them splitting their duties across multiple instruments, but in the interest of time I will reluctantly just give a special mention to Howard Jacobs, whose credits include the contrabass clarinet, timpani, baritone sax, flute and percussion. There was and is no question about the talent assembled beneath the blue, red and sometimes green light, surrounding Gibbons, draped in darkness with her face mostly in shadow.

There were highlights that were songs I had never heard, like “Mysteries” from that aforementioned 2002 collaboration with Paul Webb (using his stage name Rustin Man), Out of Season. It is a fantastic, folky, acoustic-guitar led tune that fits quite well into the setlist for this current tour, but not seamlessly. It was for me one of the most memorable parts of the set, despite my total lack of familiarity with the track. Perhaps it was due to the higher register she sings it in recalling her work for Portishead, maybe it was the brighter sound and arrangement. But where some tunes faded into the darkness, or into others that had been played previously, this one stood out, not like a sore thumb but as a shining light, even before they’d began their encore.

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Beth Gibbons

Photo – Ian Laidlaw

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When that encore arrived, how pleasantly surprised was I to hear two Portishead cuts, both off of the aforementioned Dummy? Pretty damn surprised, and in a damn good way. It’s great that, even after hearing her voice in a far more folky, and grounded context for the majority of the show, she could tap back into the more nasal cabaret of “Glory Box” so easily. Those opening lines were as sultry, sexy and melancholy as they are on the recordings from more than thirty years ago, and it was something to behold. As was the sparse and haunting “Roads”, which just sounded that much more incredible with live strings and guitar. And free from the lower registers of her more earthy solo work, her piercing head voice is as magic and moving as it ever has been.

We are probably never getting a Portishead tour again, and I am not trying to make this review into an impassioned fan letter to ‘get the band back together!’. What I took away from the show is that we, as fans of Portishead, Gibbons, and of music, are truly lucky that she is still active, working on new releases and touring. Hers is a voice that was long ago immortalised, and as an artist she has banked enough credits to make whatever music she wants. It really is a privilege to see and hear that music, whatever form it takes, and even more so when she sneaks in some deep cuts just to satiate our appetites. This Lives Outgrown tour will put audiences before one of the best to stand before a microphone, and that is the fact of the matter.

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Beth Gibbons

Photo – Ian Laidlaw

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Photo – Ian Laidlaw

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Beth Gibbons.

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