Terri Dunbar-Curran
POP outfit Beatenberg is back in town and looking forward to entertaining fans at the popular Camphill Village Music Festival up the West Coast on Saturday.
They will be joined on stage by the likes of Just Jinjer performing songs from their upcoming album, Hemelbesem bringing his hip hop humour, Ottoman Slap with their Balkan beats, blues band The Bootleggers, and Swallowers of Time with their own brand of blues rock.
Also on the line-up are rappers Che-V and SillyBoi, pop and RnB singer TashnaB and pop artist Ceejay.
“We’ll pretty much be doing songs from our first album, and we’re looking to add some new stuff,” says Beatenberg bassist Ross Dorkin. “We’ll bring the music people know and some they don’t. We hope it’s a good energy.”
The trio, which includes bassist Dorkin, vocalist and guitarist Matthew Field, and drummer Robin Brink, was pleased to be invited to be part of the festivities this year.
“It sounded like a good thing to be involved with,” said Dorkin.
Over the past 50 years, Camphill Village has provided an inclusive approach to life for intellectually disabled adults. Residents live in group homes and contribute to the running of a dairy, bakery, cosmetic workshop and working farm.
The items they produce are sold at a variety of shops in Cape Town, and the revenue is used to sustain the organisation. The annual festival raises further funds for the community.
Beatenberg’s performance at Camphill is just one of the first in a series of gigs in and around town. “It’s really cool, we’re going to invest ourselves in the Western Cape in the next while,” says Brink. “Especially now that summer is coming up.”
Running through their packed schedule, Dorkin agrees: “We’re coming into season now, so we have quite a few shows coming up. We’ll gig most weekends in November and December.”
In addition to gigging, the band is also spending as much time in studio as possible. Their previous album, The Hanging Gardens of Beatenberg, was released in 2014, and features hits like Raphael and Chelsea Blakemore. “We’ve got our own studio space which is really exciting. Our main priority is working on new material,” says Dorkin.
So, can fans expect a new album in the near future? “Albums never come out as soon as you like,” says Dorkin.
“But the point is we’re getting the material down. The whole process always takes a long time, but we’re hoping to get it done asap.”
Beatenberg started out as an acoustic band. “I had a nylon string guitar,” says Field, a finger-style guitarist. “That was very unusual for a trio band that wasn’t playing traditional music. And Rob also has a soft touch.” Brink explains that he found he played acoustic well, “or at least, I was sensitive to it”.
Field says that the band started out being very limited to the sounds that their instruments made. “A lot of people used to group us as a folk act, which we never identified with. We became more interested in making sounds that were more pop than folk.”
They began to use a computer to generate interesting sounds, which then caught the attention of Universal. The band began to delve into a wide variety of synthesised sounds. “A very broad palette – almost too broad…” says Field. “These day you can do so much, you have to choose your limitations. And we still place a lot of emphasis on playing our instruments, and good musicianship is still a value we have.”
Despite their exploration of the diverse soundscape, they are adamant that the core of being a trio which plays instruments will never change. Their creative process feeds off their connection and commitment to their instruments. “Matt’s the songwriter. We bring our energy to it in whatever capacity is appropriate to the song. Then we all produce the album together, because sometimes we want to change the sounds as we go,” says Dorkin.
Growing in popularity, the band finds themselves playing to ever-expanding crowds, and while a growing fan-base is always appreciated, they remember the days of smaller gigs fondly. “I’d like to get back to playing for 20 people in a room,” says Brink, recalling their more intimate acoustic performances. “We enjoy playing in venues and places where people are attentive,” agrees Dorkin. Keep an eye on their Facebook page and Twitter feed for news of upcoming gigs around the Mother City this summer.
l Gates open at 11am, live music from 1pm to 7pm. Tickets: R200, R100 for under 13s, free for under 4s, www.webtick ets.co.za, facebook.com /beatenberg, twitter.com/beatenberg_band