New Zealand’s finest indie exports The Beths are back with their fourth album, Straight Line Was A Lie
This marks The Beths first full-length since 2022’s Expert in a Dying Field, and their debut release with ANTI-.
Sonically, “No Joy” hits familiar Beths territory—driving percussion, razor-sharp melodies, and a lyric that cuts both ways: “This year’s gonna kill me / Gonna kill me.”
But there’s a deeper current running through it too. Frontperson Liz Stokes has been open about the track’s exploration of anhedonia—when you’re not exactly sad, just weirdly disconnected. “I wasn’t getting joy from the things I used to love,” she says. “It’s very literal.”
The album wrestles with the illusion of progress—emotional, creative, or otherwise. “Linear progression is an illusion,” Stokes says. “What life really is, is maintenance. But you can find meaning in the maintenance.” That quiet, persistent effort—to keep showing up—shapes the record’s core.
Straight Line Was A Lie also signals a creative shift. Stokes took to a Remington typewriter every morning during writing sessions, spilling pages of stream-of-consciousness thoughts that later became the bones of the album. She and guitarist/producer Jonathan Pearce leaned into experimentation, taking inspiration from Stephen King, Drive-By Truckers, and even Kurosawa films during an extended LA writing stint.
The result is a record that feels both intimate and expansive—still unmistakably The Beths, but more open, more layered, and more willing to sit with the weird stuff.
The Beths will hit the road globally this fall, playing their biggest venues yet—including The Wiltern in LA, The Salt Shed in Chicago, and Brooklyn Paramount in NYC. Stokes recently previewed some of this material at a sold-out solo show in LA, joined by guests Courtney Barnett, Roz Hernandez, and Bret McKenzie.
Watch the video for No Joy above, and pre-order Straight Line Was A Lie now.
