{"id":2319,"date":"2025-07-17T08:35:07","date_gmt":"2025-07-17T08:35:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/2319\/"},"modified":"2025-07-17T08:35:07","modified_gmt":"2025-07-17T08:35:07","slug":"i-cant-believe-not-everyone-catastrophises-liz-stokes-of-kiwi-band-the-beths-on-anxiety-ambition-and-being-anti-optimisation-music","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/2319\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018I can\u2019t believe not everyone catastrophises!\u2019: Liz Stokes of Kiwi band the Beths on anxiety, ambition and being anti-optimisation | Music"},"content":{"rendered":"

In January 2023, as flash floods hit Auckland, New Zealand<\/a>, Oakley Creek was destroyed: trees upturned, bridges ripped out and dragged downstream, the riverbank collapsed. Like many locals, Liz Stokes, songwriter and guitarist in indie four-piece the Beths, had walked there often during the pandemic. \u201cIt\u2019s jarring to see this place that\u2019s never going to be the way it was, the way you remembered it,\u201d she says over video in late June.<\/p>\n

She catches herself. \u201cI say the creek was destroyed, but the creek did the destroying also. It\u2019s just nature. It was interesting seeing change happen very quickly in real time.\u201d<\/p>\n

The collapse became the subject of\u00a0Mosquitoes, a wistful track on the Beths\u2019 fourth album, Straight Line Was a Lie. As Stokes observes the wreckage she concludes: \u201cThe\u00a0current has forgotten how it felt to break the world.\u201d Even before you know the record\u2019s backstory, her delivery imbues those languid creek waters with a sense of defeat, something deeper than just a postcard\u00a0from her neighbourhood.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Over four Beths albums, critics have\u00a0singled out Stokes\u2019s sensitive observations about anxiety and connection: she perfectly characterised flailing in the aftermath of broken relationships as being an \u201cexpert in a dying field\u201d, the title of their last album. On that record\u2019s Knees Deep, she expresses admiration for someone who always jumps feet-first into life while she\u2019s \u201cwading in up to the ankles\u201d and fearing every second (although the whole band bungee-jumped for the video<\/a>).<\/p>\n

\u2018Intentionally or not, I\u2019ve been putting walls between me and new experiences\u2019<\/p>\n

The Beths\u2019 magnetism comes from\u00a0how these former jazz school students make jangly guitar pop as joyful and tender as Stokes\u2019s lyrics are\u00a0knotted with self-doubt. Pitchfork called their first album, 2018\u2019s Future Me Hates Me \u201cone of the most impressive indie-rock debuts of the year<\/a>\u201d. The\u00a0band\u2019s endearing image, including\u00a0an excellently thorough blog\u00a0run\u00a0by bassist Ben Sinclair that documents their tour breakfasts, makes success seem like child\u2019s play.<\/p>\n

Straight Line Was\u00a0a\u00a0Lie represents a levelling up: it\u2019s their first for US label\u00a0Anti, home to Waxahatchee and\u00a0MJ Lenderman, heralding a tour\u00a0of\u00a0much bigger venues. It\u2019s a long\u00a0way from their founding pipe dream of playing Auckland\u2019s 250-capacity Whammy Bar. \u201cWe\u2019ve\u00a0had to rewrite some of our pipe\u00a0dreams so they\u2019re a lot pipe-ier,\u201d says Stokes. \u201cWe\u2019re lucky that it\u2019s grown so consistently so far.\u201d<\/p>\n

Busy Lizzie \u2026 The Beths appearing at Primavera Sound in Madrid in 2023. Photograph: Mariano Regidor\/Redferns<\/p>\n

Our time difference means that while I\u2019m drinking a breakfast coffee, Stokes, 34, is having an early-evening White Russian. \u201cI was nervous about this interview,\u201d she admits, \u201cso I made myself a cocktail, but with milk instead of cream.\u201d She is a little shy, talking from the home studio she shares with her bandmate, guitarist Jonathan Pearce, also the band\u2019s producer and her romantic partner of\u00a0 10 years. (Drummer Tristan Deck completes the band.) Stokes is a born catastrophiser. She has a sort of yeah duh laugh: \u201cAnd you know what? I\u00a0can\u2019t believe that not everybody sees\u00a0the world that way!\u201d<\/p>\n

The title Straight Line Was a Lie encapsulates Stokes\u2019s frustration at realising that life doesn\u2019t always progress in a linear path. Coming out of the pandemic and the acclaim for 2022\u2019s Expert in a Dying Field, she had hit \u201ca real mental low point\u201d. She was dealing with undiagnosed Graves\u2019 disease, which affects the eyes, the\u00a0thyroid gland and emotional regulation, feeling \u201cdepressed and very anxious and falling apart\u201d.<\/p>\n

Being prescribed antidepressants was life-changing. \u201cThe anxiety that had been this constant presence in my brain was just kind of gone,\u201d she says. \u201cI started being able to make routines, the things you\u2019re supposed to do, like exercising. I was like, oh my gosh, all this potential: I think I can fix everything in my life, my family relationships, my health.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Then the medication started to numb her out: \u201cAll my pleasures: guilty \/ Clean slate looking filthy \/ This year\u2019s gonna kill me,\u201d she sings on new song No Joy<\/a>, a perversely upbeat anthem about emotional nothingness. She felt healthy but disconnected, and struggled to write. \u201cThere\u2019s a compass that when I write, it\u2019s very instinctual and emotional to follow where the song wants to go,\u201d she says. \u201cIt felt like it was uncalibrated, not pointing very strongly in any direction.\u201d<\/p>\n

Being in a band is an exercise in sustainability. The moment it becomes unsustainable, you can\u2019t do it any more<\/p>\n

To kickstart the engine, she and Pearce went to Los Angeles. Stokes loves living in Auckland and never did\u00a0the classic \u201cbig OE\u201d (overseas experience) that gives young Kiwis a visa to work abroad; she arrived in LA craving the sort of constant cultural stimulation of music, comedy and classic film screenings that\u2019s harder to come by at home. \u201cIt made me want to write, and especially when the muscle was in action, it empowered me to want to do something better,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

As well as feeling sparked by shows by Drive-By Truckers, Momma and comedians Margaret Cho and John Mulaney, Stokes read books on writing by Stephen King<\/a> and Robert Caro<\/a>, and used a typewriter she received as a birthday present from Sinclair to do 10\u00a0pages of free-writing every day. Sitting down at the analogue keys \u201csounds incredibly pretentious\u201d, she says, \u201cbut\u00a0it was really fun. It makes a great sound. I\u2019d be like, well, I have nothing to write about, and so I was digging into memories, emotions and relationships that I don\u2019t think about\u00a0because they\u2019re very painful. Even now I\u2019m struggling to look at it. It\u2019s why I think this album has gone the way it\u2019s gone, and I\u2019ve been able to\u00a0write about things that I normally would find too difficult.\u201d<\/p>\n

Future her loves her \u2026 Stokes performing in 2013. Photograph: Tim Mosenfelder\/Getty<\/p>\n

One of those songs, the moving guitar hymn Mother, Pray for Me, is\u00a0about Stokes\u2019s mum, who is Indonesian. Stokes was born in Jakarta and the family moved to Auckland when she was four. \u201cI wanted to hurt you for the hurt you made in me,\u201d she sings, wondering if they still have time to forge a connection. Stokes finished the song a year ago and finally played it for her mum the week before we speak. \u201cEnglish is not her first language and that\u2019s part of why our relationship is complicated,\u201d she says. \u201cThere\u2019s so much love, but there\u2019s this gulf of understanding between us where we want to connect but we live in these separate planes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Showing her mum the song didn\u2019t\u00a0necessarily offer a resolution. \u201cShe was\u00a0just like: \u2018It\u2019s very nice that you wrote a\u00a0song for me\u2019,\u201d says Stokes. \u201cShe couldn\u2019t quite parse the lyrics. It\u2019s confusing \u2013 I\u2019ve writtez n this thing about what I\u2019m feeling, but it\u2019s made what I\u2019m feeling able to be understood by people like me, rather than by people like my mum. It\u2019s one I\u2019ll keep unpacking, but it was a huge relief to talk to her about it. Like anything, you build these things up in your head to be terrifying or impossible, then they\u2019re actually fine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stokes eventually came off antidepressants to a newly confronting understanding: you can\u2019t actually fix everything. Her Graves\u2019 disease is medically regulated \u201cbut it affects you emotionally even once your thyroid numbers are under control,\u201d she says. \u201cThere\u2019s always going to be that kind of anxiety and depression \u2013 I\u2019m reckoning with the fact that that\u2019s maybe not going to ever go back to the way it used to be.\u201d Counter to the prevailing culture of optimisation that insists life can be hacked to perfection, she realised that \u201ceverything is kind of maintenance. That sounds depressing but I don\u2019t think it is. Why is maintenance so unsexy? It\u2019s what you do for things that you love and you want to keep right, and I want to keep being me, so I have to keep on top of that.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

In April, Stokes and Pearce returned to LA, in part for Stokes to play a rare solo gig at storied music and comedy venue Largo (where Aimee Mann and Fiona Apple evolved their craft). \u201cWe\u2019ve done hundreds of Beths shows, but I\u2019ve done like three solo shows,\u201d she says. \u201cFor me, music feels like it\u2019s something you do with other people. That\u2019s what I would tell myself, but I was also really scared of\u00a0just doing something for myself. I\u00a0reached a point where I was like, OK,\u00a0because you\u2019re scared, you should\u00a0probably do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The show went great, though Stokes\u00a0is gearing up to tour with her\u00a0bandmates \u2013 her best friends \u2013 come September. \u201cYou have to work at\u00a0it, but\u00a0we\u2019re lucky to have each other, and\u00a0we all understand that being in a band is an exercise in sustainability,\u201d she says. \u201cThe moment it becomes unsustainable, you can\u2019t do it any more. So we have to\u00a0keep communicating and making sure everyone\u2019s OK.\u201d<\/p>\n

She credits Pearce in particular with\u00a0helping to pull her out of her shell. On new album highlight Til My Heart Stops she yearns for him to help her live with reckless joy. \u201cI\u2019m sure a lot of people feel this, but I feel like I\u2019m\u00a0looking at the world as if I\u2019m stuck behind something, like I\u2019m not part of\u00a0it,\u201d she says. \u201cIntentionally or unintentionally, I\u2019m putting out walls between me and other people and new experiences. I want to be living in the world, I want someone to yank me out. I want to yank myself out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Straight Line Was a Lie will be released on 29 August. The Beths tour the UK, Ireland, Europe, the US and Canada from September to December<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In January 2023, as flash floods hit Auckland, New Zealand, Oakley Creek was destroyed: trees upturned, bridges ripped…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2320,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[49,48,75,341],"class_list":["post-2319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entertainment","tag-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2319","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2319"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2319\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2320"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2319"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2319"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2319"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}