Live Review: Beth Gibbons @ Concert Hall, Sydney Opera House

Live Review: Beth Gibbons @ Concert Hall, Sydney Opera House

Few voices are as instantly recognisable – or as haunting – as Beth Gibbons’. Rising to prominence as the spectral, seductive presence fronting Portishead, Gibbons has long been synonymous with music that lingers: jazz-inflected, emotionally raw, and defiantly unpolished. Fourteen years after Portishead’s last Australian tour, Gibbons returned to the Opera House for her first solo outing – a set built around her 2024 LP Lives Outgrown, with scat…

Live Gallery: The Singular, Spellbinding Beth Gibbons at the Sydney Opera House 30.05.2025

It’s a clear, cool Sydney night, and inside the Opera House Concert Hall, time seems to warp. The lights are dimmed, the air expectant. Then, slowly, Beth Gibbons walks on stage — no fanfare, just presence. It’s her first-ever solo performance on Australian soil as part of Vivid Live, and the moment feels both historic and deeply personal. Gibbons — the spectral voice behind Portishead’s era-defining trip-hop — is a rare figure in contemporary m…