Beta Band - 'Heroes To Zeros' (Regal)
4/5
By: Toby L
The Beta Band don't half thwack us with some neo-psychedelic, wall-of-sound trip-outs, eh readers? If there's a band more fascinated in lazy, foggy, muggy wig-outs and space-age harmonies, then we've yet to hear 'em.
And despite the zeal that's attached to being 'unique, man', The Beta Band are still wholly accessible. And despite jibes from Nicky Wire in the early days of the band's inception that they'll 'never sell any records', Steve Mason and his fellow Scots buccaneers may not have exactly set up a weekly residency on 'Top Of The Pops', but have at least managed to amass a catalogue o' modern treats and a sizeable fanbase you'd fail to sneer at.
Their latest, 'Heroes To Zeros', marks a misleading title - our threesome are as compelling and radiant as ever. In fact, this could be the band's marked collapsing into a love of composing The Pop Song. Though Mason and crew are as fidgetingly widescreen as per the norm, this time, the subtleties are less blink and you'll miss it and arrangements are unashamed in their gargantuan, expansive border-pushing - take recent-single 'Assessment': a resolute, knowing advancement in stature, employing a cacophony of brass and thudding bass, and remarkably like Ian Brown.
What else we're awarded: the funky, playful bounce and shuffle of a harmonica-strewn 'Easy'; distantly stoned 'Wonderful', with its piano-hammering, break-out chorus; 'Out-side's scrappy garage-blues - replete with yelping dog-barks and seagull samples; mantra-like 'Space Beatle' (a come-down anthem in the making, until a sparkling, miraculous, melting 'I love you to pieces' refrain); zapping 80s synths via 'Rhododendron'; awkward stop-starts in 'Liquid Bird'; and an undeniable pinnacle in the build-up/gospel enchantment of round-the-campfire stomp, 'Pure For'.
All serves to conclude: The Beta Band in 2004? Defiantly, yearningly, an even (groan) Betta band.
Artists in this article: Beta Band
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