The Beta Band to reunite after 20 years for UK and USA tour

Alt-rockers The Beta Band have spoken of their excitement at getting back together for a reunion tour across the UK and USA more than 20 years since the group split up.

The band was formed in 1996 in St Andrews, Scotland, and went on to achieve top 20 albums as well as the support slot for Radiohead on two US tours.

The group also famously featured in the movie High Fidelity when the actor John Cusack plays The Beta Band’s song Dry the Rain in the film’s record shop.

But in 2004, financial difficulties saw the group split, with their final gig played at Edinburgh’s Liquid Room on December 4, 2004.

The new tour features the line-up of Steve Mason on guitar and vocals, bassist Richard Greentree, John Maclean on samples and keyboard and Robin Jones on drums.

Mr Greentree, who is the only Englishman in the group and lives in Portsmouth, Hampshire, told the PA news agency: “It seems this is a twice-in-a-lifetime opportunity for which I’ll be eternally grateful.

“It was an incredible time. Over the last 20 years, I have been frequently asked if I miss it, which has always seemed like an incredible question to me because as if that’s not obvious.

“It’s just what I always wanted to do, so when it ended, it was a difficult thing to come to terms with.

“And you know, when I finally did come to terms with it was when the universe seemed to have given it back to me. So it seems to have come full circle, which I’m pretty pleased about.”

The father of two left the music scene behind to focus on carpentry and bringing up his two sons for much of the time since the band ended.

He said: “One of the aspects is I’m really pleased with is that my kids are gonna get a chance to see me on stage, there’s a constant battle between me and my two sons about old cool versus new cool – it’s an opportunity for old cool to take the upper hand.”

Describing the band’s peak, he said: “I think the highlight was probably the American tours, I can’t deny it was the tours we went on with Radiohead.

“We got to play the most famous venues, the Madison Square Gardens and Hollywood Bowl and a lot of crazy venues.”

He added: “Some of the gigs when they really, really work, when they really gel together, it’s just an unbeatable feeling, you just have that dynamic, it’s not like anything else on Earth.”

Mr Greentree said that the band had kept in touch over the years, and a photoshoot at Stansted House, near Emsworth, Hampshire, was an opportunity to reconnect.

He said: “Just like the musical side of stuff is gonna come flying back, like riding a bike, so do the in-jokes.

“It is a really good dynamic – I think it’s essential, not to get on, but there has to be a dynamic in one way or the other.

“We’re quite lucky that for us, when we’re together, it’s a lot of fun.”

A deluxe vinyl reissue of The Beta Band’s first release – The Three EPs – has been released to coincide with the reunion.

The new tour has been welcomed by one of the band’s most famous fans, the author Irvine Welsh.

The Trainspotting writer said: “The band were pivotal for me in terms of my own musical journey, in that they represented a gateway back into indie guitar music, which I’d basically given up since becoming obsessed with rave and acid house.

“The emotions they induced were a kind of throwback to school days when you were very pompous and prescriptive about what you liked and derisive towards non-believers. It’s a testimony to the power of the music that they could take me to the raw state of the younger man.”

The reunion tour starts at Glasgow’s Barrowland in September, with tickets for sale to the general public from Friday, March 7.