SLED ISLAND 2013: THE BEETS

THINKING OUTSIDE OF THE LOOP

Way down in heart of Queens, NY hails a musical outfit hell bent on ridding the world of both hippies and hipsters. The Beets spit in the face of people who don’t want to be cool. This isn’t just a mission, it’s also the fitting name of their full-length LP, Spit in the Face of People Who Don’t Want to be Cool. Musically inspired by classics like The Beach Boys and The Ramones, The Beets deliver that nonchalant attitude fuelled by a never-ending house party. “We’re kinda out of the loop a bit in the music world,” vocalist and guitarist Juan Wauters confesses. “We kinda like to be out of the loop.”

Their indecisive nature is evident both in the evolution of their current name and in each and every differing live performance. “The thing is that we have changed our name a bunch of times and we changed the people in the band so much that it’s kinda hard to say when we started. We started playing constantly around 2008. Our first show that we played our name was Pow Pow back in 2004. We kept changing our band names and stuff like that and we always change up our songs,” Wauters explains.

“I’ve been thinking about playing around with some aspects of the show and maybe take control a little bit more now,” he says between chuckles. “Do some more work on consistency, maybe. We have a really laid-back vibe, we’re relaxed. Sometimes, the shows get out of control. We sound really crazy sometimes. As a fan, I would really like that. As a performer, maybe not. The other day we kinda tuned by ear before we started but than we would get out of tune. So, we were stopping between songs, but we didn’t have much time to tune between the songs. So, the whole concert was out of tune. It’s just a really really weird sound if you can imagine all of the instruments out of tune.”

Currently in the middle of a segmented slew of tour dates, The Beets seem stoked to play Calgary for the first time. Promising a raw serving of spontaneous stage antics and go-with-the-flow set lists, one should not miss this constantly evolving group. Wauters adds simply, “If you like [our music,] come to the show.”

The Beets play Tubby Dog on June 20, at the Local 510 Parking Lot on June 21 and the #1 Legion (downstairs) on June 22.

By Lori Meyers