The Beta Band Monday 21st January 2001 Hackney Ocean Most writers think, on some level, that they're pretty damn clever. Otherwise they wouldn't bother writing. And true to form I delight, as we wait for Scottish multi-instru-Mentalists the Beta Band to take to the stage, in informing the assembled that I first saw them in a little bar in Hamburg with less than a hundred people present. Never mind that I stormed the bandwagon well after their first three ground-breaking EPs had been deleted and re-released as one album (the poorly-titled but indispensable "The Three EPs.") No. Tonight I consider myself party to an intimacy that's often overlooked in their music, and which I declare in tones of drunken authority will render them sterile in a larger venue. Now it's not, you must understand, that I was wrong. It's just ah, bollocks. They were superb. I should have noted, while mouthing off pre-gig, that despite Steve Mason's yawning vocals there's a suppressed energy to the Beta Band that their latest album brings into focus. I could then have concluded that while Dry The Rain and Push It Out would indeed sound warm and gentle, Broke, Squares, Human Being and Quiet would all sound thrillingly wired. I could also have noted that "The Three EPs" and "The Beta Band" display a prodigious, flexible musical imagination; and with this in mind I might have foreseen a pant-wettingly turbo-charged version of Dr. Baker. I might finally have recalled that, at the end of my soft, cosy and intimate Hamburg gig, The House Song devolved into a fearsome percussion break that saw four men spit-roasting two drum kits (work it out). And I could have predicted that something similar would happen tonight, and that, again, it would be like getting punched repeatedly in the face by a minor deity. Had I done any of those things I'd have pronounced the show an inevitable triumph, with an increasingly confident Mason whooping, swaggering and jumping up on monitors like a proper rock star, but retaining enough stoned eccentricity to pacify indie purists. Only I didn't. Conclusions: I am neither big nor clever. But the Beta Band, more than ever, are. Catch them before they fuck it up. (c) 2002 Nathan Midgley |
The Beta Band Monday 21st January 2001 Hackney Ocean Most writers think, on some level, that they're pretty damn clever. Otherwise they wouldn't bother writing. And true to form I delight, as we wait for Scottish multi-instru-Mentalists the Beta Band to take to the stage, in informing the assembled that I first saw them in a little bar in Hamburg with less than a hundred people present. Never mind that I stormed the bandwagon well after their first three ground-breaking EPs had been deleted and re-released as one album (the poorly-titled but indispensable "The Three EPs.") No. Tonight I consider myself party to an intimacy that's often overlooked in their music, and which I declare in tones of drunken authority will render them sterile in a larger venue. Now it's not, you must understand, that I was wrong. It's just ah, bollocks. They were superb. I should have noted, while mouthing off pre-gig, that despite Steve Mason's yawning vocals there's a suppressed energy to the Beta Band that their latest album brings into focus. I could then have concluded that while Dry The Rain and Push It Out would indeed sound warm and gentle, Broke, Squares, Human Being and Quiet would all sound thrillingly wired. I could also have noted that "The Three EPs" and "The Beta Band" display a prodigious, flexible musical imagination; and with this in mind I might have foreseen a pant-wettingly turbo-charged version of Dr. Baker. I might finally have recalled that, at the end of my soft, cosy and intimate Hamburg gig, The House Song devolved into a fearsome percussion break that saw four men spit-roasting two drum kits (work it out). And I could have predicted that something similar would happen tonight, and that, again, it would be like getting punched repeatedly in the face by a minor deity. Had I done any of those things I'd have pronounced the show an inevitable triumph, with an increasingly confident Mason whooping, swaggering and jumping up on monitors like a proper rock star, but retaining enough stoned eccentricity to pacify indie purists. Only I didn't. Conclusions: I am neither big nor clever. But the Beta Band, more than ever, are. Catch them before they fuck it up. (c) 2002 Nathan Midgley |
Steady ladies... It's the Beta Band! |
