Love is learned over time as an expert in a dying field. The Beths have a thesis statement in the title track of their third album. It is a thought that is poignant, pessimistic and a little funny, which just about sums up the territory the guitar pop quartet are in. That is what The Beths do best of all, and that is what this song is euphorically catchy.
You learn who they are and why you love them as you get to know them. Even if you don’t like each other, you still know what their favorite movie is, or what makes them laugh, as Liz and Jonathan join a video call from a hotel room to finish up a U.S. tour. It feels like you have a collection of memories, but they are not meant to be used. You can just find them and keep them.
The feeling of navigating adulthood in a chaotic reality was encapsulated by the song’s title. It feels like you’re learning how to live in the world, and then it changes. You have become an expert on something that no longer exists. Sometimes it’s hard to deal with that. She says it became harder to ignore that once a Pandemic took over. You have more time to think about people you don’t see anymore. It feels like we are living in a different world as everything feels different. We had to grieve for something that doesn’t exist anymore. There are big and small things.
She says the record hopefully doesn’t sound melancholy. It would be nice to have some fun, would it?
The Beths made New Zealand’s hottest independent export from the outset with their first two albums. They opened for bands like Death Cab for Cutie, and even declared themselves a fan in an interview with the band’s vocalist. The group, who got to know each other studying jazz at the University of auckland, have their roots in the local scene. New Zealand music has no middle people until you get to a very high level. If you want to do a thing, you can find out how to do it. You meet people who are doing the same thing and work it out together. I think people are doing that.
The band recorded their third album, Expert in a Dying Field, at the same studio as their previous two. They were feeling uninspired and directionless as they wrote. It was a blessing in disguise, as they were given time to write more songs and rewrite existing ones, and finally had an album they were excited about when they came back at the end of the year.
We were starting to feel like we lost our way with it, and we weren’t really going somewhere that we felt was meaningful. We felt like we could do it after being locked down. We had been making something that was too studio and too produced, and then we stripped a lot of the ideas back so that someone could sit in front of you with just a guitar and play and sing, and fully explain the song.
Some of The Beths’s best songs include “Silence Is Golden” or “Knees Deep” or “Your Side” or “When You Know You Know” She says that she was focused on writing songs that were stimulating. That is a real intention. When you listen to a record and some songs you will like in a few listens, but some of them are immediate, and I love them. I feel like I have tried to write every single song that I have ever written.
It’s somewhat surprising that a band that studied trumpet and was trained in jazz is interested in pop music. Writing a perfect pop song is a discipline for The Beths. We both reject the ego of alternative music where people are trying to do clever things or cerebral things. We look at the things that work. The devices that make the job happen are the ones that get the heart racing.
Green Day and Fall Out Boy were among the bands that played guitar music on pop radio. I feel like I am writing pop songs but I have been in love since I was a kid with guitar music. It feels fun to me and it doesn’t feel like an alternative.
In addition to honing their craft musically, the band, best known for their self-deprecating and despairing lyrics, such as “lying awake with future cold shakes from stupid mistakes” and “future me hates me for”, is also known for their self-deprecating and despairing lyrics. There are some faint hopes on tracks like “When You Know You Know” and “I Want To Listen.” The first two records have a little bit of cautious optimism, which is not really there. It doesn’t feel bad when you’re at rock bottom, what if things get better? It doesn’t feel like a huge risk.
There is only so many times you can write a self-loathing song. How many of them are in the back catalog now? We have to find some other emotions to put in the music. There are love songs that say ‘I love you’ without also saying ‘but I hate myself’.
Having begun to play tracks from the album on tour, it has been a relief for the band to see their fans. It is the sign of a successful album, but it also reduces the weight of painful moments that inspired them. All these lives, every song that you make goes through them. When you listen to it, it is not just about the thing that it is about anymore. When a person listens to a song at home, they fill it with their own memories and associations. Sometimes people let you become a part of their life with a song that is really special to them. It’s a house with your own furniture. In this field, the Beths are experts.