Portishead preps Third, tours

It's been an exhilarating week for Portishead fans far and wide, and in particular for those located on the West coast of the United States, the island of Great Britain, and on the great continent of Europe. Not only were we able to recently report that Portishead will be headlining the mystical festival of Coachella, but yesterday Portishead announced via its blog that more show dates have been confirmed in its home country and on the Continent, and that the band's third full-length studio album, appropriately titled Third, will be released on April 14.

Not much has been heard from the trip-hop group in the past 10 years, apart from singer Beth Gibbons' well received collaboration with Rustin Man (entitled Out of Season), Portishead's appearance at the Tsunami Benefit Concert in 2005 (where Geoff Barrow announced for the first time that the band had reentered the studio) and the performance in December at the All Tomorrow's Parties festival in England.

After the ATP festival, where the band played a few songs from the upcoming record, rumors swept the Internet, some claiming that this image, allegedly the set list for the festival show, contains some of the working titles of songs on Third: "Wicca", "Hunter", "Machine Gun", "Mystic" and "Peaches." The authenticity of this gossip is unsubstantiated (which is why it's called gossip), but nevertheless shows just how excited rabid Portishead fans are about their first fix since 1998's remix album Glory Times.

Here, to aid just such a fix, is Portishead performing "Roads" at ATP:

Complete tour dates:

March
26 - Porto, Portugal @ Coliseum
27 - Lisbon, Portugal @ Coliseum
30 - Milan, Italy @ Alcatraz
31 - Florence, Italy @ Sashall

April
2 - Munich, Germany @ Tonhalle
3 - Berlin, Germany @ Columbiahalle
4 - Copenhagen, Denmark @ KB Halle
6 - Cologne, Germany @ Palladium
7 - Amsterdam, The Netherlands @ HMH
9 - Manchester, England @ Apollo
10 - London, England @ Hammersmith Apollo
11 - Edinburgh, Scotland @ Corn Exchange
13 - Wolverhampton, England @Civic
26 - Indio, CA @ Coachella