In Montreal, on a farewell tour of sorts – Portishead drummer and composer Geoff Barrow is leaving the trio – the krautrock experimentation of Bristol’s Beak> was met with some challenges, but still delivered.

Any knowledge of the band would give a pretty good indication of what was to be expected: primarily tracks from their surprise 2024 album entitled “>>>>”, followed by a few older tracks. Beak> isn’t really a singles-driven outfit, nor do they engage in singalongs. But the band drew an enthusiastic sell out crowd in one of Montreal’s best medium-sized venues, the Théâtre Fairmount. The only thing that held back what was almost a truly great night out were technical difficulties. On a cold spring night in Montreal, Beak> were able to make it through a bit of a challenging start. With Geoff Barrow on drums and banter, Billy Fuller on bass and vocals and Will Young on everything else, the band did the best they could, but it was obvious that there was a little frustration with elements of the sound. Lots of feedback and stop starts (“Secrets” was a tune that didn’t get off the ground) meant that the audience was witness to Beak> making do with a less-than-ideal situation. But less than the best is still pretty good for Beak>.

Barrow threw in a couple of jabs and jokes about touring the “51st state”, which met with a chorus of boos and loud opinions yelled from the audience, but it was all in good fun. After all, Barrow mentioned, UK folks have had to deal with Brexit, so they might have some understanding of national precarity. But there is nothing perilous or shaky about Beak>’s sonic approach. As they barrelled through the issues, they produced a rousing and raucous wall of sound.

Their fourth album works well as a moody, noisy playlist, with smoother bits and pieces like the melodic “Hungry Are We” and the languorous “Cellophane”. On this outing, it wasn’t a complete full run through of the recent record, however. The synthy ballad “Eggdog” and throbbing “Breandown” from previous records were early inclusions. Barrow referenced the fact that this was his last tour, but indicated that Beak> would continue. A look at previous set lists indicates that Montreal missed out on a couple tracks, but the one-two triumphant punch of the beat-driven “Wulfstan II” and “Blagdon Lake” led the dance-averse crowd to bounce and bob right to the end. As Fuller stood up to triumphantly reveal a broken bass, and Barrow waved farewell as he left the stage, it was clear that there would be no encore, but that was ok.

Words by Erin MacLeod

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