Trip Hop Through the Tulips - Portishead's "Dummy"

One of the most influential - and imitated – records of the 90s, Dummy was also, for a while, the dinner party music of choice for hip households. It also came to define the occasionally maligned genre of trip hop. A dark mix of slow scratchy beats, self made samples and the eerie torch singing of Beth Gibbons, Dummy virtually defines the Bristol sound of the early and mid 90s.

Geoff Barrow had originally started his musical career playing drums in dodgy rock bands before discovering the joys of turntables and samplers in the late 80s. He later found work as an apprentice engineer at Bristol’s Coach House Studios, just as the city’s Wild Bunch collective was blossoming into success with Massive Attack and Soul II Soul. It was a chance meeting with singer BethGibbons while attending an Enterprise Allowance scheme in 1991 that led to the formation of Portishead.

With help from Massive Attack manager Cameron McVey, Barrow worked on demos which harnessed his burgeoning studio skills to Gibbon’s smoky, torch singer vocals. The addition of seasoned jazz guitarist Adrian Utley to the line up leant the project a new focus, spurring Barrow on to create his own samples which he would then manipulate to create the band’s trademark dense textures.

Musically the album drew on influences as diverse as Barrow’s beloved hip hop, late night jazz and film soundtracks. The then current vogue for retro-chic (which found Bacharach and John Barry back in fashion) was echoed perfectly in the LaloShifrin sampling single Sour Times, while Isaac Hayes provided the source for Glory Box’s distinctive descending bass line.

All this musical inventiveness would have mattered little without the eerie, emotive vocals of Beth Gibbons, whose performance drew comparisons with such icons as Billie Holliday. Gibbon’s and Barrow’s reluctance to entertain the press only added to the group’s mystique, although Gibbons maintained there was no tortured artist behind her performance. Whatever, the record’s spooky, mellow charms struck a chord with critics and public alike, winning it the Mercury Music Prize and a place in millions of homes, not all of them hosting dinner parties…