The appreciation for Portishead’s latest album Third (review) has grown from a murmur upon release to a rising rapture of applause now that everyone – including Radiohead and, just now in the DiS office, Black Lips’ Cole Alexander – has given it chance to sink in.

Seems Third’s a grower, but the spurt may be stunted according to comments from Geoff Barrow.

“Perhaps it could be our last record but I hope not,” Barrow told 6Music. “Everyone’s really happy and now we seem like we’ve broken through this wall that has been stopping us making music for such a long time. We all feel it’s fairly good.”

The Portishead man went on to explain that the band did have some new ideas for tracks, but that there was nothing definite planned just yet – the need to find a label after their current deal with Universal expired with Third one factor in the uncertainty.

“We’ve got some ideas of what we would like to do but they’re really just rough ideas,” he continued.

“I mean – if we haven’t got a record deal we could put it out ourselves, we could go to a large indie that really likes music.”

What the future holds for Portishead remains to be seen, but Barrow admitted that his band “haven’t talked to any body yet – we haven’t talked to Universal yet.”