After releasing
Expert in a Dying Field (2022) -- the hooky indie rockers' third album and most melancholy endeavor yet --
the Beths'
Elizabeth Stokes was having trouble writing new songs. Likely exacerbated by, if not caused by, having recently started on an SSRI, she and bandmate
Jonathan Pearce, who's produced all their albums, delved into the writing process with books on both writing and tackling projects (including
Stephen King's enduring advice book, On Writing). Additionally, they stimulated creativity by attending shows, watching arthouse films, and so on. For a month,
Stokes started every morning by hammering out ten pages of stream-of-consciousness prose on a Remington typewriter. The resulting album,
Straight Line Was a Lie, features her most personal and confessional material yet, and while her lyrics have always been self-depreciating and full of obstacles, here they struggle with overwhelm. Still offering some of
the Beths' familiar humor, however, the album begins with a false start before launching into "Straight Line Was a Lie," a hooky and lively, partly group-sung effort that nevertheless features lines such as "I thought I was getting better/But I'm back to where I started." Other punchy tracks include, perhaps ironically, the distortion-heavy "No Joy," a song explicitly about
Stokes' experiences with being zoned out on antidepressants ("Anhedonic on the daily/Wanna feel but I am failing"). Most of the songs here, though, tend toward the midtempo and reflective, ranging from the surprisingly post-punky "Take" to the diffident "Mother, Pray for Me," a song stripped down to plucked guitar and organ, about
Stokes' complicated and somewhat distant relationship with her mother. Despite its frequently overcast tone,
Straight Line Was a Lie is, in typical
Beths fashion, dependably catchy and sweetly harmonic. The record closes on the funky rocker "Best Laid Plans," whose bubbly bongos and mirroring syncopated guitar rhythms uplift lyrics about powering through another Friday. ~ Marcy Donelson
