Album Review

Beans On Toast – Best Of Toast

• 19th Apr 2014

Best of Beans is a special release for Record Store Day on 19 April. The 10″ vinyl pressing comprises six tracks: two from Beans’ debut album and one each from the four that have followed. It is a limited edition with only 300 hand numbered & signed copies to be released. The compilation features collaborations with Emmy The Great & Dan Smith (Bastille), and producers include Frank Turner and Ben Lovett (Mumford and Sons).

Beans On Toast, apparently known to his close friends as Jay, is something of a musical outsider, an underground cult figure. His simply constructed folk songs cover a wide range of subjects and typically feature sparse instrumentation with the focus on his deep vocals and darkly witty, powerful lyrics. At times his tongue is planted firmly in cheek, but at others he is deadly serious. Think of the John Cooper Clarke school of punk poetry and you won’t be too far away.

The record opens with two tracks from 2009’s Standing On A Chair. Mdmamazing mixes a jaunty guitar backing with a tale of drug taking and love at a festival, while Price Of Rice gives an alternative take on the economic collapse, sung with Emmy The Great. The final message is not to worry about the bigger picture, just to do your best and treat people as you would wish to be treated.

Old Grunge from Writing On A Wall (2010) sees Beans reminiscing on his teenage days in an Essex grunge band before he expands on his eclectic musical tastes. Can’t Take Another Earthquake from Trying To Tell The Truth (2011) features Dan Smith (Bastille) and Kate Tempest in an upbeat track about how close the world is to disaster. Noted spoken word artist Tempest adds a fine fast vocal section that lights up the track.

Beer & Burger, taken from Fishing For A Thank You (2012), opens with a trumpet before taking a humorous shot at middle England’s chain pubs and those who spend their lives in them. Closing track Things from Giving Everything (2012) explains Beans’ “three chord masterplan” and less than serious take on life in a very entertaining fashion.

This is a must have collectable for fans of Beans On Toast and a good introduction to a highly entertaining artist for everyone else. His biting lyrics and rough vocals give him a strong presence and he uses it to mix humour and politics very well. The approach is more poetic than musical; this is a man with a lot to say.

Venue: Best Of Toast
Support Band: Rise Records