{"id":343290,"date":"2026-03-23T06:16:14","date_gmt":"2026-03-23T06:16:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/343290\/"},"modified":"2026-03-23T06:16:14","modified_gmt":"2026-03-23T06:16:14","slug":"a-band-who-like-to-have-fun-the-beths-live-in-christchurch-reviewed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/343290\/","title":{"rendered":"A band who like to have fun: The Beths live in Christchurch, reviewed"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0Shanti Mathias finds the globetrotting Auckland band slicker than ever on their current New Zealand tour.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is like, the third or fourth pancake,\u201d said Liz Stokes, holding her glittery white electric guitar in \u014ctautahi\u2019s James Hay Theatre. She meant that The Beths, New Zealand\u2019s indie-pop favourites, have been touring their new album across Europe and the US for months, and they have the performance down.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It certainly felt that way. I\u2019ve been listening to The Beths since 2018, and Christchurch\u2019s Town Hall (admittedly a smaller theatre off the main auditorium) is much nicer than the sticky floors of San Fran in Wellington where I saw them perform first. The Beths are slick \u2013 they\u2019ve played each of their songs, from the new album as well as earlier releases, hundreds of times, and it shows.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Liz,Liz Stokes and Jonathan Pearce of The Beths on stage in \u014ctautahi (Image: Shanti Mathias)<\/p>\n

The contrast with opening band Bub made this clear. Bub are excellent \u2013 lead singer Priya Sami is funny, wore pink eyeliner, and won the whole audience over with a song she had written at age 15 about marrying Julian Casablancas of The Strokes. But they had to pause while Sami reconfigured her guitar pedals, while The Beths have mastered the ability to tune their instruments while talking. Bub\u2019s performance was endearingly chaotic, but The Beths just got on with it, \u201cplaying songs in a businesslike fashion\u201d, as guitarist Jonathan Pearce noted at one point. It was the band\u2019s strength as well as a weakness, the assured energy from each member of the band making it slightly harder to get inside the music.\u00a0<\/p>\n

When Straight Line was a Lie \u2013 The Beths\u2019s most recent album \u2013 was released in August 2025, frontwoman Stokes talked extensively<\/a> about the personal experiences that had inspired the music; the 2023 Auckland floods, taking antidepressants and her complex relationship with her Indonesian mum. Performing music that personal, especially when it\u2019s high energy, with complicated guitar and bass lines, must take a toll. This was most noticeable in Stokes\u2019 solo performance of \u2018Mother Pray for Me\u2019, the intimacy of the song and heartfelt words not given quite enough space to breathe after jokey band introductions and before launching into \u2018Knees Deep\u2019.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"TheLiz Stokes, Ben Sinclair, Tristan Deck and Jonathan Pearce of The Beths.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the punishment part of the set,\u201d Pearce joked, after playing Straight Line was a Lie track \u2018Roundabout\u2019. \u201cBut we want to keep playing songs from our new album.\u201d
The difference between songs with really clear hooks and choruses and some of the band\u2019s more obscure repertoire was obvious. I liked having the opportunity to listen to these songs more closely, appreciating new dimensions I hadn\u2019t heard on the recording. But I would have liked to hear the musicians briefly talk about the music and introduce these lesser-known songs, instead of rushing past them. As it was, the only commentary on the music was Stokes remarking that \u2018Mother Pray for Me\u2019 was an \u201cintimate\u201d song.\u00a0<\/p>\n

At times, it felt like the band was trying to bring back a primary school music class: Pearce and Sinclair pulled out brightly coloured plastic recorders, Stokes dinged a triangle, then used a banana shaker. It added a bit of visual variety to the show, and felt like an affirmation that The Beths are a band who like to have fun. The set design was simple but excellent: a painted banner with the band\u2019s name rendered as twirling vines, cloth-covered lamps that flicked on and off, immaculate work from the lighting team with twirling gels cutting through the haze.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With four acclaimed albums and EP Warm Blood, there\u2019s a lot of music for The Beths to choose from. But they\u2019re clearly determined not to get caught in nostalgia (unlike other blockbuster New Zealand performances<\/a>): everyone likes Future Me Hates Me, but the band clearly wants people to appreciate different songs from their new album. That dedication to the new makes me convinced The Beths will be able to keep going from strength to strength. It helps that each member is so musically talented: Pearce shines in guitar solos, like in \u2018No Joy\u2019, and I particularly liked how drummer Tristan Deck added texture on slower songs like \u2018Take\u2019 and \u2018Best Laid Plans\u2019.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The very personal, specific words of \u2018Mother Pray for Me\u2019 and \u2018Mosquitoes\u2019 sounded amazing from the front of general admission, but I also appreciated how well some of the album\u2019s more abstract lyrics came across when sung by everyone around me. Here is where all that practice shines: Stokes moved effortlessly through starting-again single \u2018Straight Line was a Lie\u2019 and iron-deficiency anthem \u2018Metal\u2019 until it was impossible for the crowd not to see ourselves in the words. The Beths have always been a band set apart by their mix of incisive and wry lyrics: yes, I do need the metal in my blood to keep me alive! Yes, I don\u2019t know if I can go round again, even as the fractal chorus decays into a perfect mix of Stokes and backing vocals from the band.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The best song of the night was undoubtedly \u2018Till my Heart Stops\u2019, a manifesto of sorts, toeing the line between excessively twee and moving. Live, the music sounded fuller \u2013 a little more space for the bass line, perhaps? \u2013 than the recording. \u201cI fly my kite in a hurricane,\u201d sang Stokes, and it felt so true, even though it had been warm and sunny all day. The lyrics seemed so perfect for the moment, the hurricanes we cannot control, the joy and fun required to keep going as straight lines curve around you. When the song finished, the person standing next to me was wiping tears from her eyes. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u00a0Shanti Mathias finds the globetrotting Auckland band slicker than ever on their current New Zealand tour.\u00a0 \u201cThis is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":343291,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[183108,492,156,157,106890,111,139,69,1066,130314],"class_list":["post-343290","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-aotearoa-music","tag-comments-enabled","tag-entertainment","tag-music","tag-music-review","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-pop-culture","tag-the-beths"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/343290","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=343290"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/343290\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/343291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=343290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=343290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=343290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}