The Bees’ Isle Of Wight studio has been a hive of activity over the past few months as the band put the finishing touches to their fourth album.
After a brief period of respite to “work on our personal lives”, the collective are back on the scene and this time they mean business. Armed with a new label, a new sound, and a new musical vision, they are keen to break loose from stale ‘retro’ stereotyping and explore fresh sonic territory.
According to lead vocalist Paul Butler, getting the right tempo on this latest album was really important. “The record’s still a mixed bag, but there are more skippy bits with elements of artists like Van Morrison. We all embraced the freedom in rhythm and bass and you can definitely hear that in the songs,” he says. “Many of the tracks kind of follow a South American groove, which I guess is partly down to my time spent in the Amazon Rainforest, after a gig producing Devendra Banhart’s new album took me to the States. It was all pretty amazing.”
Butler self-produced this record in his souped-up basement studio. Wired with all manner of vintage electronics, the studio’s piece de resistance is a gun metal recording desk which was excavated from a Swedish radio station and brought to life for the purposes of music production.
So when can we expect the album? “It’s basically finished but I’m a perfectionist of sorts and so am still at the meticulous tweaking stage,” says Butler. “I can spend hours just listening to the tracks over and over again.”
We are already buzzing to hear it.
Words by April Welsh
Album title: TBC
Release date: August/September
Producer: Paul Butler
Songs include: ‘I Really Need Love’, ‘Winter Rose’, ‘Tired Of Loving’, ‘The Dink’ (working title)
Other facts: See the sitar in the picture? The band made good use of it on this album, particularly on tracks like ‘I Really Need Love’.
