beabadoobee has had quite a year. Following the release of her long-awaited 2020 debut album Fake It Flowers, the Londoner upped the ante and wrote and recorded Our Extended Play EP, released in June, with labelmates Matty Healy and George Daniel of The 1975. And finally, as restrictions have begun to lift and live music is returning, beabadoobee is back on the road, currently touring through North America with fellow Dirty Hit signees BLACKSTARKIDS and Christian Leave as support.
As Bea’s sound has transformed from her lo-fi bedroom pop to a heavier, grunge-forward vibe, her songwriting itself has become much more specific and noteworthy. Seeing her show at Webster Hall in New York City last week, it was extremely clear that this sonic evolution has come to define the project and its future, even if Bea herself doesn’t think her guitar work is that special: “I’m not the best guitarist either, that’s the reason I play with a lot of tunings because it makes it ten times easier for me.”
Indeed, Bea and her guitarist, Jacob Bugden (with whom she’s writing her next record), changed guitars about eight times each throughout the evening, ensuring that each song would come across just as vibrant and powerful as it is on her records. And there’s plenty more to come; when asking if the next record will feature more heavy, ’90s-inspired grunge and pop punk like Fake It Flowers’ “Charlie Brown,” she gave some more details, claiming she’s “never made such different songs in one piece of music before… there’re some songs where it’s just me and some songs where it’s very heavy.”
Even if the new album ended up being entirely covers, it would still unapologetically sound like beabadoobee, now heavily stylized and era-specific. Witnessing one of her shows felt like a secret passageway into a nostalgia-ridden world of rock, overwhelmingly cool and buzzing with energy (speaking of: BLACKSTARKIDS were one of the best opening acts that this writer has seen in a while, and even with a mere 30 minutes, they absolutely brought the house down).
Consequence caught up with beabadoobee backstage in early November to chat about getting back on the road, her favorite films, what she was up to during lockdown, and much more. Check out the Q&A below.
