Portishead’s long awaited new album, ‘Third’, has been described as the “older brother or sister” to the band’s previous releases by band member Adrian Utley.

Utley added, however, that the album – the groups first for eleven years – “sounds nothing like” its predecessors, 'Dummy' or 'Portishead'.

“It's the same mindset we've always had, only further down the road,” he told Billboard.

Fans will get their first chance to hear the record live during upcoming UK dates this spring.

Although there has been a long wait for the group’s third album, Utley said that at no point did the band not exist.

“There was never no Portishead, it was just we'd had enough, and we didn't have any ideas,” he said. We all got on with various different things, but we worked on each others' projects.

“There was always a Portishead. We have ongoing business, obviously, to deal with - permissions and compilations and film requests, even if we're not doing anything at all."

‘Third’ will be released on April 28th.

(by Jason Gregory)