12 Songs: > & +
Still reeling from having all your previous musical preferences absolutely blown away by Beak>?
Welcome to the club.
If you’re a fan of the band (which we figure you might be if you’ve clicked this far), finding similar sounding artists to enjoy can be a difficult task, simply because Beak> exist on their own musical plane. On top of that, they’re pretty good about camouflaging their influences. But we’ve done the dirty work for you; here’s our attempt at mapping out the band’s sonic ancestry, trawled from an extensive list of kraut/electronic/prog icons.
Cluster immediately comes to mind. Beak’s Yatton sounds a bit like a spiritual sequel to Caramel.
To our perhaps overly-scrutinous ears, Eggdog is just Starless by King Crimson condensed into a digestible pop tune. The inverse could also be said about Eggdog and Procol Harum’s 60’s baroque pop staple A Whiter Shade of Pale.
The group invokes Sabbath with The Brazilian, which is undoubtedly their heaviest track.
And it all comes back to Computer Love. Kraftwerk is the real origin of species here.
Here’s 12 Songs: Beak> and Beyond, a rough outline of what could be considered the “Beak> family tree.” It’s a rabbit hole within a rabbit hole, and should quench any newly-acquired thirst for the offbeat you might have. Algorithm free as always. —Jackson Todd
Listen to 12 Songs: Beak> and Beyond on Spotify here.
[artwork: John Miller, Rookery D001, 2013]
