Despite keeping us waiting 11 years to follow up their second album with this year’s magnificent Third, the newly prolific Portishead have started planning their fourth album. Producer and multi-instrumentalist Geoff Barrow (centre) told BBC 6Music that the band have started getting ideas together, building expectations for a release next year. They also plan to do a lot more touring than last time around.

“When everyone’s had a bit of a break, I think we’re just going to plough onto it,” said Barrow. “I think we’re kind of there now. We’ve sat down and we’ve talked about the direction and stuff like that.

“Everyone seems really positive about it. And I think everybody at some point wants to get back out on the road, because we didn’t really do an awful lot of live stuff. What’s really interesting is that we’re in this lucky position now. We haven’t got a record company; our deal ended and so did our publishing deal.

“So we pretty much own all of our own rights now, which is scary as well as exciting really, so we’re thinking of loads of different ways of doing things.”