The Beths have announced their new album, Expert In A Dying Field, out September 16th on Carpark Records, and share the new single/video, “Silence Is Golden.” On Expert In A Dying Field, Elizabeth Stokes’ songwriting positions her somewhere between being a novelist and a documentarian. The songs collected here are autobiographical, but they’re also character sketches of relationships – platonic, familial, romantic – and more importantly, their aftermaths. The shapes and ghosts left in absences. The question that hangs in the air: what do you do with how intimately versed you’ve become in a person, once they’re gone from your life?
The third LP from the New Zealand quartet houses 12 jewels of tight, guitar-heavy songs that worm their way into your head, an incandescent collision of power-pop and skuzz. With Expert, The Beths wanted to make an album meant to be experienced live, for both the listeners and themselves. They wanted it to be fun — to hear, to play — in spite of the prickling anxiety throughout the lyrics, the fear of change and struggle to cope. Expert is an extension of the same sonic palette the band has built across their catalog, pop hooks embedded in incisive indie rock.
Most of Expert was recorded at guitarist Jonathan Pearce’s studio on Karangahape Road in Tāmaki Makaurau, Aotearoa (Auckland, New Zealand) — and sometimes in the building’s cavernous stairwell at 1AM — toward the end of 2021, until they were interrupted by a four-month national lockdown. They traded notes remotely for months, songwriting from afar and fleshing out the arrangements alone, the first time they’d written together in such a way. The following February, The Beths left the country for the first time in more than two years to tour across the US, and simultaneously finish mixing the album on the road. That latter half felt more collaborative, with everyone on-hand to trade notes in real time, until it all culminated in a chaotic three-day studio mad-dash in Los Angeles. There, Expert finally became the record they were hearing in their heads.
Expert In A Dying Field Tracklist
- Expert In A Dying Field
- Knees Deep
- Silence Is Golden
- Your Side
- I Want To Listen
- Head In The Clouds
- Best Left
- Change In The Weather
- When You Know You Know
- A Passing Rain
- I Told You That I Was Afraid
- 2am
The Beths Tour Dates
Tickets available from thebeths.com
Sun. Jul. 24 – Seattle, WA @ Capitol Hill Block Party
Mon. Jul. 25 – Vancouver, BC @ Biltmore Cabaret
Fri. Jul. 29 – Brooklyn, NY @ BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Festival
Sun. Jul. 31 – Denver, CO @ UMS – The Underground Music Showcase
Tue. Aug. 2 – San Diego, CA @ Belly Up Tavern
Wed. Aug. 3 – Santa Ana, CA @ The Observatory
Thu. Aug. 4 – Santa Barbara, CA @ SoHo Restaurant & Music Club
Fri. Aug. 5 – San Francisco, CA @ Outside Lands Music Festival
Sun. Aug. 7 – Salt Lake City, UT @ Urban Lounge
Wed. Aug. 10 – Davenport, IA @ Raccoon Motel
Thu. Aug. 11 – Cleveland, OH @ Grog Shop
Sat. Aug. 13 – North Adams, MA @ Here and There Festival, Mass MoCA
Sun. Aug. 14 – Toronto, ON @ Lee’s Palace
Mon. Aug. 15 – Detroit, MI @ The Magic Bag
Tue. Aug. 16 – Chicago, IL @ Here and There Festival, Salt Shed
Thu. Aug. 18 – St. Louis, MO @ Blueberry Hill
Fri. Aug. 19 – Indianapolis, IN @ Hi-Fi
Sat. Aug. 20 – Covington, KY (Cincinnati) @ Madison Live
Mon. Aug. 22 – Durham, NC @ Motorco Music Hall
Tue. Aug. 23 – Richmond, VA @ The Broadberry
Thu. Aug. 25 – Baltimore, MD @ Ottobar
Fri. Aug. 26 – Asbury Park, NJ @ Asbury Lanes
Sat. Aug. 27 – Portland, ME @ Portland House of Music & Events
Sun. Aug. 28 – Montreal, QC @ Bar Le Ritz
Wed. Aug. 31 – Pittsburgh, PA @ Spirit Hall
Thu. Sep. 1 – Columbus, OH @ A&R Music Bar
