When playing music started to feel routine to
Beak>
after the countless shows they performed in support of
Beak 4
(aka
>>>>
) something had to change. Though their third album's feints toward accessibility landed closer to pop's uncanny valley than the top of the charts,
Geoff Barrow
,
Billy Fuller
, and
Will Young
return to their roots on
and, fittingly, deliver some of their most subterranean-sounding music. "Strawberry Line" begins the album with an invocation of the trio's powers that builds from an organ-driven dirge into a starscape of arpeggiated synths; that it's dedicated to the band's late dog Alfie (who surrounds
with a heart-shaped laser beam on the album cover) makes its transformation that much more moving. On the songs that follow, all of the group's modes are on display: Their classic motoric -- which has become as synonymous with
as it is with forebears like
Can
-- speeds between klaxon synths on "The Seal." Underpinned by clanking and strafing rhythms that showcase the attention to percussion that has marked
Barrow
's projects since
Portishead
, "Secrets" is a hypnotic example of their mechanical melancholy. On "Hungry We Are," a decrepit folk-prog ballad,
reaffirm that they're bleakest when they're softest. No matter which direction they take on
, they remain brilliant at suggesting entropy without letting the music actually fall apart. In the hands of a less skilled band, the way "Bloody Miles"' mournfully fluttering keyboards give way to downtrodden funk could be disjointed instead of transporting. Similarly, "Denim"'s bleary tones and off-kilter shuffle blur the boundaries between arch and poignant in a manner few other artists would attempt. A few traces of
Beak 3
's DNA remain on "Ah Yeh," a song that could be a rawer sequel to "Brean Down," but the spontaneity
show here -- and on the rest of
-- reflects how they created this music without any expectations. They embrace unpredictability fully on the outlandish grunge-psych-electro-meltdown "Windmill Hill" and on "Cellophane," which sends the album off with a
Stooges
-like rock inferno. While it's unlikely that
could or would become a truly "accessible" band, it's also unmistakable how revitalized they sound as they revel in
's rough edges and surprises. ~ Heather Phares