Are Peter Bjorn and John the new Beta Band?

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Am I the only one who hears a parallel between Writer's Block and The Three EP's? Somehow, they both seem to capture the same ineffable aesthetic: gimmicky instrumentation, instantly memorable melodies, overall bohemian vibe, etc. Maybe I'm reading too much into it. I guess it's just the kind of perfect quirky pop music that doesn't rear its head too often.

― souldesqueeze, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 00:01 (nineteen years ago)

nope it's fluff give it a couple more listens and it's shiny veneer will start to look a bit tatty

the new aliens lp is the new beta band lp though cos 3 of them wrote it

― spotter, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 00:05 (nineteen years ago)

they're both vile, 'young folks' has to be one of the most irritating songs i've ever heard and the beta band have always been unspeakable

― lex pretend, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 00:38 (nineteen years ago)

Thanks for the input.

― souldesqueeze, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 00:38 (nineteen years ago)

thats totally valid.. i can see the equivalents, there's a kitchen somewhere, where this dude named "grateful dave" who has a VW van and a weird girlfriend named spacey tracey who hangs out in front of your house in their van, then visits to use the toaster and is really into the tapes he got from the 3 dead shows he went to before it became bob weir & rat dog and he's like "yah dude, this peter bjorn n john sounds like something my brother's into" and it turns out his brothers really into belle & sebastian and hides out his in his room most of the time, and you're like 'yah, check out the bass line" and he's -- about two joints later-- trippin hard and loving it..

peterbjorn&john + beta band = hippy heaven

good call dude

― 7seasjim, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 02:31 (nineteen years ago)

hahaha, "spacey tracey"

― souldesqueeze, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 09:51 (nineteen years ago)

I don't hear any parallel between them: The Three EPs were much more fresh and new sounding, but Writer's Block is just pleasant music, without any signs of innovation.

― zeus, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 11:47 (nineteen years ago)

I kind of hate it when Lex pops up on threads that don't have to deal with the current creative fertility of house and techno music to slam stuff, but then I get excited because I get to drag that quote out again, and it always makes me smile.

― Ben Boyerrr, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 12:57 (nineteen years ago)

"i know a girl named stacey
whose brain is kinda spacey"

― Fetchboy, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 13:21 (nineteen years ago)

The Beta Band always struck me as far more wilfully wacky and psychedelic (alibeit, psyche lite) than PG & J, who sound like ersatz c86, which was already a bit ersatz. The Aliens record is great tho.

― Angsty, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 17:48 (nineteen years ago)

*The Beta Band always struck me as far more wilfully wacky and psychedelic*

OTM

I can't see Peter Bjorn and John ever doing a song(?) like "Monolith".

― Sum Fitch, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 18:19 (nineteen years ago)

Yeah, "Monolith" kills me every time.

― souldesqueeze, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 21:20 (nineteen years ago)

that entire 'patty patty sound' ep is not-of-this-earth

― unfished business, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 21:31 (nineteen years ago)

There is a slightly lounge-y, easy listening vibe to both of them so its a good comparison, but one that shows up how narrow PB&J sound is compared to the best bits of beta band.

Theres a blandness to PB&J, an Ikea coffee table, a glossy magazine with funky photography and design but no actually well written articles blandness that makes them sound like a lifestyle accessorry more than a collection of tunes.

Maybe there is nothing wrong with this, we all need accessorries, but sometimes The Beta Band trancended that and actually sounded new, and actually quite startling.

― Sandy Blair, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 08:10 (nineteen years ago)

How exactly did the Beta Band sound "new"?

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 08:51 (nineteen years ago)

or indeed 'startling'!

― lex pretend, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 08:55 (nineteen years ago)

They never sounded new, that was kind of their virtue. The thing I loved about Hot Shots II (far more than their other records) was the way they took all these cues from dancehall and glitch and so forth and amalgamated them into this whole sleepy, smokey, slightly out-of-time aesthetic.

― Matt DC, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 09:56 (nineteen years ago)

Or, to put it another way, did bog-standard indie and cut and pasted obscure bits of their record collections on top.

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 10:00 (nineteen years ago)

marcello otm (except not so much 'obscure' as 'unknown to indie kids')

― lex pretend, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 10:13 (nineteen years ago)

There were a few songs on the Three EPs and the first album which sounded like nothing else before, but maybe it's just me. Also, it's strange, that Lex hates 'Young Folks' - this seemed gay enough for poptimists.

― zeus, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 10:13 (nineteen years ago)

wooooooooooooooooh

― blueski, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 10:21 (nineteen years ago)

get her!

― blueski, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 10:22 (nineteen years ago)

I don't believe they were really 'cut and pasted', a lot of those songs wouldn't have stood up in the same way without the beats winding through them. A big part of why people here went for Hots Shots II was that they'd taken enough attention to make sure the beats and squelches sounded more organic and integrated with the music rather than clumsily tacked on (see the Klaxons as an example of how not to do it). And this is from someone who never really liked the Three EPs.

Then again arguments like this, or "current creative fertility of house and techno music" or "revolutionary greatness of Broken Social Scene" usually bring up 'emporers new clothes' style responses anyway so I'm not sure quite why I'm bothering.

― Matt DC, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 10:24 (nineteen years ago)

'young folks' is gay as in completely fucking lame

― lex pretend, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 10:24 (nineteen years ago)

Beta Band were best when they weren't trying to be "we're mad, us."

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 10:30 (nineteen years ago)

Basically they were McGuinness Flint with added Roger Ruskin Spear.

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 10:34 (nineteen years ago)

Matt (and Marcelo too) OTM
I like the Beta Band's melodies more, than their topsy-turvy electronics sometimes.

― zeus, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 10:35 (nineteen years ago)

'young folks' is gay as in completely fucking lame

I smell a pull quote!

― Ben Boyerrr, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 12:33 (nineteen years ago)

'young folks' is gay as in completely fucking lame

Why is this statement ok?

― Angsty, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:00 (nineteen years ago)

You must be new here.

― Colonel Poo, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:05 (nineteen years ago)

Yup. I am. And I'm not foolish enough to think that this is the first time anyone has objected to someone using the word "gay" like that.
But as someone who is new, I'm still curious.

― Angsty, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:09 (nineteen years ago)

I didn't hear anything particularly gay in "Young Folks." It wasn't about man on man sex, it included no references to Bette Midler or Freddie Mercury, and it wasn't written by Sondheim.
It did have that whistling bit tho. I guess whistling is kinda light in the loafers.
I'm now convinced, it is totally homosexual.
And come on, Peter Bjorn and John? Could there be gayer names? I bet they're all having gay sex in a Swedish bathhouse as we speak. And I bet Bjorn is on top.

― Angsty, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:13 (nineteen years ago)

Brilliant, glad to have you!

― call all destroyer, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:19 (nineteen years ago)

Pretty mediocre in trolling terms.

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:20 (nineteen years ago)

Lex is gay, which I guess is what Col. Poo is getting at.

Only know "Young Folks" - it's rubbish, Sandy Blair OTM, it seems very zestless to me.

― Groke, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:20 (nineteen years ago)

Well then hey, I'm a homo too and I still think using the word "gay" in lieu of "lame" is absurd and lazy.

"Pretty mediocre in trolling terms." Fabulous. I'm really going to like you, aren't I Marcello?

― Angsty, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:23 (nineteen years ago)

Yeah. I've not seen Lex use it that way before, so I guess he was being knowingly lazy in re. Zeus's lazy conception of "stuff Poptimists like".

― Groke, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:24 (nineteen years ago)

Wrong way round. We decide whether we like you. And we don't. Bye!

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:24 (nineteen years ago)

Fair enough.

And I should clarify, I wasn't trolling (if it means what I think it means). I was genuinely curious. I'm never interested in stirring up the pot for the sake of it and I'm more than happy to let something drop. Like I will now.

But back to PB & J, "zestless" describes them perfectly.

― Angsty, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:27 (nineteen years ago)

Pretty Mediocre in Trolling Terms: The Marcello Carlin Story

― braveclub, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:34 (nineteen years ago)

Marcello, calm down. My initial comment was based on a misapprehension of what the word trolling means. With the gays it has a somewhat sordid and seedy connotation, which I was reacting against. But I'm still not going anywhere.

― Angsty, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:34 (nineteen years ago)

I find most criticism of PB&J to be really, truly baffling. I can certainly see not liking them, but people act like they're the first band to be sort of formalistic in their approach.

― call all destroyer, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:39 (nineteen years ago)

'Young Folks' is a very nice veering-between-jaunty-and-sleepy-eyed piece of music without the vocals. I mean I suspect that it wouldn't get half as much hate if it had been an instrumental (true of so much stuff tho I suppose).

― blueski, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:44 (nineteen years ago)

Is it the vocals that annoy people? That honestly never occurred to me. "Young Folks" is all about shakers and bongo drums. And reverb on bongo drums. That is what the song is about.

― call all destroyer, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:46 (nineteen years ago)

Steve it wouldn't have got half as much attention if it had been an instrumental!

The original is slightly plodding compared to the Beyond The Wizard's Sleeve mix.

― Matt DC, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:54 (nineteen years ago)

It's a great song and a great record and anyone who doesn't like it deserves all the Hilary Duff records they get.

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:54 (nineteen years ago)

all good people deserve hilarity records! 'young folks' only wishes it had the effortless charm and emotional clout of eg 'fly', 'the math', 'beat of my heart', 'with love', 'never stop', 'dreamer' and 'come clean'.

― lex pretend, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 15:01 (nineteen years ago)

I think that's your mistake. It probably doesn't wish it had those things.

― call all destroyer, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 15:02 (nineteen years ago)

"effortless"

― Ben Boyerrr, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 15:03 (nineteen years ago)

Yeah. I've not seen Lex use it that way before, so I guess he was being knowingly lazy in re. Zeus's lazy conception of "stuff Poptimists like".

indeed, i am mildly irritated that this had to be spelt out. the conception of lots of pop as only suitable for teenage girls and the gays is one of the more condescending ways to dismiss it.

― lex pretend, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 15:04 (nineteen years ago)

Skipping 28 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

i'm too tired for a dog fight today

― strongohulkington, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 16:43 (nineteen years ago)

long night

― strongohulkington, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 16:43 (nineteen years ago)

Is prejudice by definition irrational?

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 16:44 (nineteen years ago)

http://www.splitfocus.org/pics/lis-robot.jpg

― strongohulkington, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 16:45 (nineteen years ago)

okay i just had one of those "i'm baiting marcello on a thread about peter, bjorn, and john" mini-epiphanies. back to work.

― strongohulkington, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 16:45 (nineteen years ago)

Thankfully I opted to hide images.

Walter Brennan, however.

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 16:46 (nineteen years ago)

ILX troll-clashes are like heavyweight boxing these days: no dream fights left anymore.

― Dom Passantino, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 16:47 (nineteen years ago)

You were expecting Ricky Gervais versus Anthea Turner?

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 16:48 (nineteen years ago)

that's almost as good as when sylvester called me the "al gore of bloggers"

someone...i forget who, someone once called me the ann coulter of poptimism :D

― lex pretend, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 16:51 (nineteen years ago)

It's nothing to smile about.

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 16:54 (nineteen years ago)

Truth is beauty, Marcello.

― nabisco, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 18:11 (nineteen years ago)

"How exactly did the Beta Band sound "new"?"

I mean 'new' as in meaning sticking to gether a collection of old things in a way that makes then look new, rather than meaning, well, y'know actually new.

― Sandy Blair, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 22:21 (nineteen years ago)

"What is truth?" (Johnny Cash, pp MC)

― Marcello Carlin, Thursday, 22 March 2007 08:36 (nineteen years ago)

It's important to note that Lex is very wrong about The Beta Band, and I say this as someone who says that Lex is wrong probably less than anyone else on ILM.

― Tim F, Thursday, 22 March 2007 09:31 (nineteen years ago)

It's bemusing that anyone can get worked up one way or the other over the Beta Band at this late stage.

― Marcello Carlin, Thursday, 22 March 2007 09:49 (nineteen years ago)

I'm interested to know why you dislike them Marcello, I wouldn't have guessed that. Or are you merely indifferent? Either way I'm curious as to why.

― Tim F, Friday, 23 March 2007 00:16 (nineteen years ago)

i'm interested, and mildly shocked, as to why you like them tim! or...are beck, super furry animals, all those awful people part of the indie past you've referred to...

― lex pretend, Friday, 23 March 2007 00:17 (nineteen years ago)

and we don't care about the young folk
talking about the young stuff

and we dont care about the old folks talking about the old stuff too

repeat x3

all we care about is talking, me and you.

=win?

― wesley useche, Friday, 23 March 2007 01:41 (nineteen years ago)

"i'm interested, and mildly shocked, as to why you like them tim! or...are beck, super furry animals, all those awful people part of the indie past you've referred to..."

Not really! I got into The Beta Band in 1999, which was about the same time that I got into dance music and hip hop really heavily (and R&B too, but I'd always been into R&B at least a bit). At the time they seemed like UK indie that was open to everything that UK indie wasn't open to - not just Timbaland/garage style rhythms, but house music, sampling, krautrock, gamelan etc. etc. This in itself wasn't enough to make them great, but it helped when it was combined with their knack for making these really odd, spooky, strangely affecting pop songs - "Dr. Baker", "Needles In My Eyes", "Dance O'er the Border", "Brokenupadingdong", "To You Alone", "Broke", "Won"... Not because the former (interesting sonics) need the latter (strangely affecting pop songs) in order to work, but because the tension between the two works really well in this case. Esp. parts of the self-titled record for me anticipate the curious attraction of Animal Collective etc.

In pretty much the same way that the tension between traditional songfulness and interesting sonics (dancehall/bhangra/crunk etc. etc.) can work so well in R&B. If you are against any type of songfulness or instrumentation which can be linked even vaguely to the merest hint of British indie, then The Beta Band will fail where an R&B artist might succeed, but my beef with British indie was never with the genre in and of itself, but rather with its general failure to live up to its own claims for itself. The Beta Band was one of the few examples at the turn of the decade (others include Piano Magic and Pul_ that did.

I should note that Champion Sounds doesn't do much for me, and this is often the record that people still think of when they're talking about the Beta Band. I'm not into them because they were briefly the Gomez it was cool to like, but because of everything that happened after that point.

Tom's article on the self-titled album is pretty great, even if (or perhaps because) its take on British music circa '99 now reads a bit oddly.

― Tim F, Friday, 23 March 2007 02:04 (nineteen years ago)

all those awful people

Oh, now just fuck off.

― Ben Boyerrr, Friday, 23 March 2007 08:03 (nineteen years ago)

My reservations about the Beta Band, as with many otherwise musically remarkable artists, come down to the fact that I couldn't stand the singer's voice.

― Marcello Carlin, Friday, 23 March 2007 08:30 (nineteen years ago)

tom's article is great! tempered, though, with the shock that he also likes the beta band, i am reeling here, did you all like gomez as well? can't trust anyone these days.

of course where i differ is that i just can't hear any sort of charm in the beta band, it seems (seemed! years since i last heard them of course) self-satisfied with its own very minor, conservatively experimental tendencies in the same way as gomez/beck/sfa - all these bands who are the worst of the worst, apart from lad-rock like oasis.

i kind of react to a lot of what tom says in, i guess, the same way that people might react to us when we talk about ciara's voice - it's taking a lot of negative attributes and presenting them as the reason to like something. but whereas i've always said eg "x has a negative attribute of a thin voice but she uses it in a way that it becomes a positive attribute", tom seems to accept the beta band's...messiness, the every-direction splurge as what it is. though i've not particularly heard that in them either - yeah i hear the ramshackle messy crapness, that whole "hey we can't play our instruments or sing or produce well and have no ambitions to do any of them" thing which irks me about indie, but i don't hear ideas bouncing in every direction, i hear really really bog standard student-indie mumblings with clumsy samples over the top.

...do you like animal collective, tim? please don't say you do. why u break heart, &c &c.

― lex pretend, Friday, 23 March 2007 08:34 (nineteen years ago)

four stars for hilary duff in today's guardian, folks.

― Marcello Carlin, Friday, 23 March 2007 08:35 (nineteen years ago)

yeah! it's really good.

― lex pretend, Friday, 23 March 2007 08:37 (nineteen years ago)

If it really is comparable with Come And Get It then I will most likely check it out.

Is anyone doing the Robyn album over at Farringdon Towers?

― Marcello Carlin, Friday, 23 March 2007 09:07 (nineteen years ago)

Steve Mason of the Beta Band once gave a very Lex-like interview in the NME where they asked him what bands he liked, and he said something like 'we don't listen to any of that indie shite, we only listen to real music, hip hop and reggae!'

also, Hot Shots II was produced by the same dude who did Jamelia's excellent early singles (Money etc). that album isn't at all ramshackle or messy, it's pretty tight & economical and sounded a lot more 'now' in 2001 than Gomez & the rest.

― jabba hands, Friday, 23 March 2007 09:07 (nineteen years ago)

was gonna say, lex, hot shots is some straight up 00s r&b shit - its not like you hate indie dude vocalists anyway

― and what, Friday, 23 March 2007 09:18 (nineteen years ago)

self-satisfied with its own very minor, conservatively experimental tendencies

Lex you would be livid if this criticism was applied to, say, a Ciara production you particularly liked.

― Matt DC, Friday, 23 March 2007 09:34 (nineteen years ago)

Also Hot Shots >>>>>>>>>> every other Beta Band record ever.

― Matt DC, Friday, 23 March 2007 09:37 (nineteen years ago)

the first time i heard the beta band was around 00 i think, i can't remember what the song was called but i remember sitting bolt upright in shock/horror and saying out loud "they have fucking ripped off the bassline of kelis's 'good stuff' and made it sound really lame!" does this ring a bell to the people who like them? nothing else i ever heard by them was even half that notable.

Lex you would be livid if this criticism was applied to, say, a Ciara production you particularly liked.

well yeah cos it wouldn't apply! ciara is neither self-satisfied (on record) nor conservative in her production.

If it really is comparable with Come And Get It then I will most likely check it out.

Is anyone doing the Robyn album over at Farringdon Towers?

it's not as consistent as CAGI but v impressive nonetheless - esp as i'd been sceptical about her abandonment of that bubblegum-lite sound which previously served her so well. no idea re robyn, that woman irks me, and i suspect she's actually going to be properly successful now, which also irks me.

― lex pretend, Friday, 23 March 2007 09:45 (nineteen years ago)

aahahha lex i know what you mean its that one track off 3 EPs that has this endless shuffly funky drummer lite beat with them moaning over top - not so good!!! but hot shots is not like that for real

― and what, Friday, 23 March 2007 09:54 (nineteen years ago)

Promise aside, the production on The Evolution is mostly conservative within the context of rnb. I mean, I like it a lot, but there's nothing even remotely surprising on there sonically. But this debate is all about "minor experimental tendancies" - little things like SFA running an acid line through a punk pop song. It continues to annoy me that people are happy to hail every slight sonic progression or gimmick within the context of rnb or house, but as soon as an indie band does it it's de facto cynical or contrived or half-arsededly tacked on. </strawmanbuilding>

I don't think the Beta Band sound particularly self-satisfied either. Actually they mostly sound dissatisfied or downright miserable. Bearing in mind they actually branded one of their own albums shit before they even released it. Which it was.

― Matt DC, Friday, 23 March 2007 09:55 (nineteen years ago)

that one track off 3 EPs that has this endless shuffly funky drummer lite beat with them moaning over top

Haha, so a couple of years before 'Good Stuff', then?

― Matt DC, Friday, 23 March 2007 09:55 (nineteen years ago)

Matt OTM, but 'Hot Shots II' is not the best Beta Band record, though it's awesome too. Even Lex would like it if the singer was a girl.

― zeus, Friday, 23 March 2007 10:03 (nineteen years ago)

maybe not self-satisfied so much as...you know, it's that "will this do" mediocrity common to so much british music

― lex pretend, Friday, 23 March 2007 10:03 (nineteen years ago)

Or imagine "To You Alone" sung by, say, Tracey Thorn = perfect Lexpop, no question.

― zeus, Friday, 23 March 2007 10:06 (nineteen years ago)

i think it's perfectly ok to prefer people who can sing over people who can't! (and before the ciara/paris cracks roll in, ciara can at least hit the few notes she aims at, and paris has autotune where beta band bloke has mumbling tunelessness)

― lex pretend, Friday, 23 March 2007 10:09 (nineteen years ago)

Haha there you go Lex. You're annoyed that they've 'settled' for being an indie band as opposed to anything else. I mean, the ultimate 'will this do?' genre in British music over the last few years has been grime and I haven't seen you apply that criticism there.

― Matt DC, Friday, 23 March 2007 10:10 (nineteen years ago)

grime was at its best when totally confident in itself!

am trying to think of british indie i like...it does seem to be mostly american, when i do like it. pj harvey? scritti politti? er.

― lex pretend, Friday, 23 March 2007 10:12 (nineteen years ago)

yeah the 3 eps came out in '97 & '98 and "the good stuff" was released in 2000.

― jed_, Friday, 23 March 2007 13:57 (nineteen years ago)

think i prefer the KBT stuff overall.

― blueski, Friday, 23 March 2007 14:05 (nineteen years ago)

robyn, that woman irks me, and i suspect she's actually going to be properly successful now, which also irks me.

lex pretend

:D :D :D

― fandango, Friday, 23 March 2007 14:08 (nineteen years ago)

last 20 posts here are GOLD

― fandango, Friday, 23 March 2007 14:15 (nineteen years ago)

(and not just for lex baiting, but for actually cutting through a fair bit of accumulated cross-genre bs, Matt DC repeatedly otm)

― fandango, Friday, 23 March 2007 14:18 (nineteen years ago)

"Promise aside, the production on The Evolution is mostly conservative within the context of rnb. I mean, I like it a lot, but there's nothing even remotely surprising on there sonically. But this debate is all about "minor experimental tendancies" - little things like SFA running an acid line through a punk pop song. It continues to annoy me that people are happy to hail every slight sonic progression or gimmick within the context of rnb or house, but as soon as an indie band does it it's de facto cynical or contrived or half-arsededly tacked on. </strawmanbuilding> "

I totally agree Matt. Part of the "problem" with indie as such is that generally the people who like a lot of indie don't like interesting sonic ideas, and the people who usually like interesting sonic ideas refuse to listen to indie even when it has them! No wonder most indie is stuck in a greyscale holding pattern. And The Hot Shots II is a more interesting album sonically than The Evolution. Ciara may be a better singer but the singer in The Beta Band had really worked out how to exploit his voice by that point - that ballad at about track 4 is so beautiful. The only track I don't like is "Quiet", which plays into Lex's hands a bit (boring conservative rock with a big chorus) and is, go figure, the one all the rock critics plumped for.

On the other hand Matt, I don't think The Beta Band's self-titled album is awful. Or rather, maybe half is, but the other half is really great and sometimes my favourite stuff by them!

I do like the Animal Collective Lex, although not so much that I have collected heaps of stuff by them. Actually they're very much in the same category as the self-titled Beta Band album for me - half of what i hear I could do without, and the other half is great.

By the way, Lex the track you heard was from Champion Sounds I think. They got much more interesting later on. I don't like Gomez.

― Tim F, Saturday, 24 March 2007 05:23 (nineteen years ago)

"tom's article is great! tempered, though, with the shock that he also likes the beta band"

You're misinterpreting him, I think, Lex.

"i kind of react to a lot of what tom says in, i guess, the same way that people might react to us when we talk about ciara's voice - it's taking a lot of negative attributes and presenting them as the reason to like something. but whereas i've always said eg "x has a negative attribute of a thin voice but she uses it in a way that it becomes a positive attribute", tom seems to accept the beta band's...messiness, the every-direction splurge as what it is."

I think you're drawing a distinction here which does not exist. If you start from the premise that a certain musical characteristic cannot by definition be a positive, then a line like "x has a negative attribute of a thin voice but she uses it in a way that it becomes a positive attribute" will always appear to be celebrating the negative attribute for its negativity. This is precisely why people don't understand us re "Promise".

I think what Tom is celebrating is not messiness per se but the delicate negotiation between mess and coherency, randomness and pop smarts. The best parts of The Beta Band have this great sense of coming together just when you think it's all about to go off the rails, and it's partly the tension in this negotiation - a lot more common nowadays than in 2000 perhaps - which made the album so interesting. Tom expressly contrasts this against the "play to the centre" strategy of power-pop (an unthreatening dilution of pop and noise together) - note the potshot at Geir!

I don't think I've ever seen you praise anything in those terms though Lex. I mean the closest thing I can think of that you like is maybe Ricardo Villalobos, and that's not close at all.

― Tim F, Saturday, 24 March 2007 05:30 (nineteen years ago)

four years pass...

Wow, this thread's a blast from the past. Anyway, reviving this because there's no new thread for their album this year Gimme Some -- good album! -- and because I just did a quick phone interview with John. Funny, thoughtful guy!

― Ned Raggett, Thursday, 14 April 2011 14:50 (fifteen years ago)

And the new Beta Band proved to be apt. After the Young Folks breakthrough, they made a mad dash away from the mainstream with Living Thing. I can only imagine how much that must have pissed off Wichita: "Hello label! We have made an album entirely without the things that made people love our last album!" Enough that they are no longer on Wichita, certainly.

― Now working on a documentary about Sham 69's recent tour of China (ithappens), Thursday, 14 April 2011 14:59 (fifteen years ago)

one month passes...

And my interview's up:

http://www.ocweekly.com/2011-06-02/music/peter-bjorn-and-john-eriksson/

― Ned Raggett, Friday, 3 June 2011 00:47 (fifteen years ago)

four years pass...

This ain't bad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsiwAgMtmvE

― Ⓓⓡ. (Johnny Fever), Wednesday, 16 March 2016 03:52 (ten years ago)

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