Beta Band reform for new tour after 21 years away

Indie rock group The Beta Band are to reunite for their first tour in 21 years.

The four-piece formed in Fife in 1996 and released a string of acclaimed EPs and albums before breaking up in 2004.

The reunion tour begins on 25 September at Glasgow’s Barrowlands, before dates in Leeds, Bristol, Nottingham, London and Manchester. This will be followed by a run of American shows.

The group said they would play their 1998 album The Three E.P.’s – which collected their early recordings – as well as “other classics” on the tour.

They released two further albums Hot Shots II in 2001 and Heroes to Zeros in 2004.

The band said: “The Beta Band, as everyone knows, is an institution, like Bedlam, or the RSPCA, and as such has its own indelible stain on the bedsheet of Western culture.

“It was the great John Noakes who said ‘you have to shake it out at least once every couple of decades, if you want to know what the moths did.’

“So with both those facts in mind, we realise the time has come to show the wall the Luminol, kill the lights and hit the UV.”

The line-up for the tour will be Steve Mason on guitar and vocals, Richard Greentree on bass, John Maclean on samples and keyboards and Robin Jones on drums.

Their music featured in Hollywood film High Fidelity, where their track Dry the Rain was spotlighted by the main character, played by John Cusack.

After the band split following an Edinburgh gig in December 2004, Mason released music as a solo artist while Maclean and Jones formed another band, the Aliens.

Maclean also moved into film, directing Slow West in 2015 and this year’s Tornado, which opened the Glasgow Film Festival last week.