Nirvana vs. Portishead

Nirvana, easy.

^ Mailo, while it is quite different from the earlier Posrtishead, and you may not enjoy it, I hope you like it. I love it. It is more on the Krautrock side (that opening track), with folk and folktronica and a little more alternative/ experimental rock. It's also the album that I consider most Prog-related by Portishead. I hadn't tried until not that long ago myself. I neglected it thinking that it didn't have as high a reputation as the earlier albums. I could understand how Beth Gibbons vocals on this (she is versatile) might be off-putting to some, but this first track hooked me immediately with its groove. It is one that I'd recommend to Can fans and the like.



I love the whole album, but recently the self-titled has been getting the most spins. I find all three studio albums to be great, and love various live performances.

This I enjoyed very much:

mellotronwave wrote: Rather hard to make a choice, both are not part of my regular daily listenings Two different styles imho. Think I still got Portishead first couple of CDs near Nir ;-) vana unplugged.

Different styles as you say, but I would also count some overlap. I know you excluded Portishead's Third from your post, but "Threads", for instance, does remind me of "Something in the Way" and these definitely have stylistic relations to my ears:





While Portishead's Third has similarities to the earlier albums, it did move away from the earlier trip hop.

nick_h_nz wrote: The closest I come to owning a Nirvana album is this release from Aranis. https://aranis.bandcamp.com/album/smells-like-aranis

I should get that or at least listen in full at some time. I love Aranis and have most of the Aranis albums.

Edited by Logan - May 27 2022 at 13:35

Rather hard to make a choice, both are not part of my regular daily listenings
Two different styles imho.
Think I still got Portishead first couple of CDs near Nir ;-) vana unplugged.

^ From cover song to cover song: This is Portishead covering ABBA's SOS (I prefer it to the original, and I like ABBA).



Edited by Logan - May 27 2022 at 08:20

Saperlipopette! wrote: Cristi wrote: Logan wrote: Interesting, I thought this would be closer. 7 to one in the votes, one shan't, and every post favouring a band is favouring Portishead. I know the second vote cast was for Nirvana, which had followed my vote for Portishead. Nirvana was overexposed and overplayed back in the day, you couldn't escape them, wherever you lived. Obviously people got tired of them, I know I did.  I remember Dummy that way, but I got over it:) I suppose it depends whether you grew up in wonderland or Tomorrowland.

As I live only a few hours drive from Seattle, I might have been expected to notice the whole Grunge scene and Nirvana more, but I spent part of the 90s working in Japan (md 90s. and post-Nirvana). Aside from the Japanese music I heard there, I was hearing more quirky pop things like The Cardigans and Bjork. I was exposed to Portishead in part because I was quite into the club scene in the 90s here in Vancouver, but it wasn't until a few years ago that I really got into Portishead, which was due to listening to a 90s late night radio sketch comedy plus music program -- it (Blue Jam) also got me into Stereolab and various "boozy-woozy" music.

That said, for the middle-aged and up I would think for many that it would have been enough time to get over that over-saturation to return to, and appreciate or re-appreciate the music and re-evaluate the music. Nirvana is considered a classic and still important and relevant by many. And I would expect that some of the younger generations would have discovered it without the baggage of having been overexposed to it at the time. And then of course it is one thing to hear the radio "hits" and another to really listen to the albums. Anyway, I have noted a significant amount of appreciation for Nirvana's music over my years here.

Lewian wrote: I like and respect Portishead, but Nirvana had a much more direct impact on me. Great band, and their music for me hasn't aged at all. A side in me wants aggressive music, but most of the bands who do such music miss me for one reason or another. Nirvana is one of the few who really get me (others are Killing Joke and Kong). In our own music we even nicked some bits of Smells Like Teen Spirit and put them into something proggy at the time. Top quality pairing, I've got to say.

Grungy or not, the music smelled fresh (like teen spirit) at the time and still smells fresh to me now. I like Killing Joke; haven't heard much Kong.

Cristi wrote: Logan wrote: Interesting, I thought this would be closer. 7 to one in the votes, one shan't, and every post favouring a band is favouring Portishead. I know the second vote cast was for Nirvana, which had followed my vote for Portishead. Nirvana was overexposed and overplayed back in the day, you couldn't escape them, wherever you lived. Obviously people got tired of them, I know I did.

I remember Dummy that way, but I got over it:) I suppose it depends whether you grew up in wonderland or Tomorrowland.


Edited by Saperlipopette! - May 27 2022 at 06:03

Interesting, I thought this would be closer. 7 to one in the votes, one shan't, and every post favouring a band is favouring Portishead. I know the second vote cast was for Nirvana, which had followed my vote for Portishead.

Like some others, it really is no contest for me either, although I like various Nirvana -- not to be confused with the Nirvana we have in PA in Proto-Prog. Along with Stereolab, Pram, Broadcast, Swans, Boards of Canada, Air, Current 93 and some others, it's a favourite of mine that I got into for 90s albums/ music. Actually, I got into 2004's Talkie Walkie by Air a little earlier than 1998's Moon Safari.

While I heard various grunge on the radio and noticed its effect, I pretty much missed that scene. I think I was just a little old for it as I was already into my 20s when it became prominent and smelled more like spleen spirits than teen spirit. I guess of the major grunge acts I knew, I liked Soundgarden the most.

I would have loved to see Portishead in concert, maybe there still be that chance. I just missed out on seeing Stereolab in concert a few years ago.

By the way, I thought of this topic because I was thinking that it is such a shame that Portishead released so few albums (plus they released some singles after Third that I like) and so I started thinking about some others with only the three studio albums. Nick Drake was the first to come to my mind, and Drake would have been an interesting one perhaps to compare to Kurt Cobain, but that topic could be more morbid than I would like.

Edited by Logan - May 27 2022 at 04:51