MELANCHOLIC Nineties Bristol band Portishead, whose downbeat "trip hop" sound was a bleak counterpoint to the brash Britpop era, are still missing in action, allegedly working on a third album.

However, singer Beth Gibbons has temporarily escaped to record an album with Rustin Man, the alter ego of Paul Webb, formerly of Talk Talk, which finds her voice as unique and as harrowing as ever. In place of Portishead's slow-motion drum loops, the sound here is acoustic-based, with sombre orchestral arrangements and the odd ghostly choir.

At times it's in a gloomily beautiful English folk rock tradition, with Gibbons a dead ringer for the ghost of Sandy Denny, while elsewhere she adopts a smoky jazz voice. Out Of Season comes close to being the classic it has been hailed as by some - especially on the opening tracks, Mysteries and Tom The Model. But as the album unfolds, the songs don't quite rise above the relentless mood of misery.

Updated: 17:19 Thursday, November 14, 2002