The Beths have announced their third studio album, ‘Expert In A Dying Field’, alongside the release of a new single titled ‘Silence Is Golden’ and Australasian tour dates.
It’s one of the Aotearoan pop-rockers’ heavier cuts, carried by propulsive, math rock-inspired drum fills and winding staccato guitars. It also sports both bass and guitar solos, the former fuzzy and slathered in distortion, and the other intentionally piercing with modulated legato slides and high-note shredding.
According to vocalist Liz Stokes, the hectic feel of the song reflects its lyrical basis. “The song is about stress and anxiety manifesting as an intolerance to noise,” she explained in a press release, “where each new sound makes you more and more stressed.”
The song arrives alongside a video directed by Callum Devlin, which shows The Beths performing the song in a dimly-lit garage. Have a look at that below:
‘Expert In A Dying Field’ will be released on September 16 via Carpark Records. It’ll mark The Beths’ third full-length effort, following 2020’s ‘Jump Rope Gazers’ and 2018’s ‘Future Me Hates Me’. Pre-orders for the album are available now, and can be found here.
According to the press release, the new record sees Stokes evolve on her songwriting style by stepping into a new role “somewhere between a novelist and a documentarian”. Its 12 songs are also said to be autobiographical in nature – with an overarching theme of relationships “and more importantly, their aftermaths” – but spun through the lenses of various characters.
Musically, the band say that ‘Expert In A Dying Field’ was written with the intent that the songs on it would shine brightest in a live setting. The bulk of the album was recorded last year at the home studio of lead guitarist Jonathan Pierce – as well as “sometimes in the building’s cavernous stairwell at 1am,” the press release notes – but sessions for it were interrupted by a four-month lockdown in New Zealand.
The album was ultimately finished in Los Angeles back in February, with “a chaotic three-day studio mad-dash” resulting in the final product.
The Beths will return to North America next month, with 26 performances – including a mix of headline gigs, festivals and showcase events – spread out until the start of September. Following the release of ‘Expert In A Dying Field’, the band will tour both Australia and New Zealand. A full list of dates are available below, and tickets for all shows will be available via the band’s website.
After they released ‘Jump Rope Gazers’ in July 2020, The Beths delivered a cover of ‘Starsign’ – by Carpark colleagues Over The Atlantic – for a compilation album released by the label that November, ‘No Cover’. On that same record, singer-songwriter Johanna Warren covered The Beths’ own ‘Happy Unhappy’.
Last September saw The Beths release their first live album, ‘Auckland, New Zealand, 2020’, which they followed up in February with the stand-alone single ‘A Real Thing’.
See the cover art and tracklist for ‘Expert In A Dying Field’ below:
1. ‘Expert In A Dying Field’
2. ‘Knees Deep’
3. ‘Silence Is Golden’
4. ‘Your Side’
5. ‘I Want To Listen’
6. ‘Head In The Clouds’
7. ‘Best Left’
8. ‘Change In The Weather’
9. ‘When You Know You Know’
10. ‘A Passing Rain’
11. ‘I Told You That I Was Afraid’
12. ‘2am’
The Beths’ Australian and New Zealand tour dates are:
SEPTEMBER
Thursday 15 – Melbourne, 170 Russell
Friday 16 – Sydney, Metro Theatre
Saturday 17 – Brisbane, The Triffid
Tuesday 20 – Adelaide, The Gov
Wednesday 21 – Perth, Magnet House
Friday 23 – Wellington, Opera House
Saturday 24 – Nelson, Theatre Royal
Friday 30 – Christchurch, James Hay Theatre
OCTOBER
Saturday 1 – Dunedin, Glenroy
Friday 7 – Auckland, Town Hall
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