The Beta Band “The Beta Band” 1999. The debut LP from Scottish experimental alt-poppers. The album came on the heels of a couple of very successful EP’s and “was at least partly recorded in a small hut belonging to [John] Maclean’s grandfather in a remote northwest part of Scotland [so they could record sound of the ocean], where the group found themselves with no room to sleep as they filled the hut with an excessive amount of musical equipment and homemade instruments.” The rest was recorded at a few other locations, intentionally lending a haphazard vibe to the record. While it did go to #18 in the UK, the band (specifically vocalist Steve Mason) called it “fucking awful…half-written songs with jams in the middle.” It’s been described by critics as a “brashly schizophrenic freak-out” that ignores conventional songwriting completely in favor of chaos. Lots of sampling, fun-house sounding toy instruments (specifically on “Round the Bend” which has a xylophone, spoons, bird whistle and I think a cuckoo clock), some ill-advised rapping (“The Beta Band Rap“) and some funky disco (with slightly better rapping) on what I think is the best track “Dance O’er the Border.” That song is also the least-representative – it is an alt-dance song that reminds of Yard Act. There’s a fair amount of ambient Floyd-scapes, too – I do like “Brokenupadingdong” which gives me Meddle and Animals feels, at least until the steel drums kick in. Also of note is “The Hard One” which almost landed the band in legal trouble as it is sort of a (uncredited) cover of Bonnie Tyler’s 1983 hit “Total Eclipse of the Heart” – rearranging the chorus’ lyrics and sampling the piano riff from the original, though I’m hard-pressed to hear much overlap between the two songs.