Beth Gibbons transforms Pedralbes into a sound ritual

BarcelonaBeth Gibbons sways with her back to the audience. She's a shy animal who doesn't know where to stand and tucks in to avoid taking up too much space. It might even seem as if she's unaware of the power of her name, inseparable from Portishead, the iconic British trip-hop band of the 1990s with which she became known. It was thanks to Dummy (1994), the trio's debut album, which revealed Gibbons's enchanting power to the world. She was 29 at the time, but already possessed a compelling maturity that seemed to have lived much longer.

Gibbons's mysticism is disconcerting because, rather than alienating it, it makes it more present and powerful. What she explains, how she explains it, and how the seven-piece band that accompanies her on stage envelops her is captivating. Gibbons is currently touring in support of the album as a solo artist. Lives outgrown (2024), a project that has been in the making for almost ten years and that reflects the passage of time with brutal honesty. Tell me who you are today, the song that opens the album, is also the one chosen to open the concert in the auditorium of the Pedralbes Palace Gardens in Barcelona. The gear has begun and the strings, so characteristic of the album, will be the only ones allowed to shape it.

The journey advances with the weight of a convinced and kneaded percussion, and with a bass that descends to the bowels of a hole in damp earth: getting into the instrument would be like that, that same sensation. When the first song disintegrates, a Burden of life, where it seems that Gibbons has lost the inevitable fight against the passage of time and has been buried in the grave. The band that accompanies her goes through this painful journey with her, surrounding her in a semicircle. They look at her, ignoring the audience, who will surrender completely to the songs and will not dare to exceed the catharsis of sounds that are born on the stage. As if the approximately 1,500 people of Pedralbes did not want to break the coven.

The journey is also luminous. The songs are a mantra that is sometimes painful and other times seems like a caress: as in Floating on a moment, built around a combined melody of wind and strings. The band plays through all the tracks on the album, and there's also room to revisit past discography without breaking the magic. Gibbons recovers the beautiful and delicate Mysteries, from the 2002 album he shared with Rustin Man (stage name of Paul Webb). Although this song has come of age, it's as if Gibbons is singing it for the first time.

All the instruments have a specific place, which never overshadows the words and the journey Gibbons proposes. The concert is a natural transition in which there is also room to revisit songs from his past with Portishead. And what a power, the tranquility of enjoying this leap and forgetting the years that have passed from one place to another.