Genre Bending With The Bees

Covering itself in glory on yet another occasion, the NME once referred to inhabitants of the feral Isle of Wight as smock-wearing inbreds. In reviewing a Bees single, they even managed to make questionable remarks about the sexual behaviour of the island's citizens, but Aaron Fletcher and Paul Butler, the song-writing duo at the heart of The Bees multi-influenced sound, have always reaffirmed their love of the island and all its quirks. As Fletcher tells us, "We've always had an affinity for our home, and that's where our studio is. We're not going to leave now we've kitted it out with stuff from Ebay."

The bad news is, the long-awaited new LP from the islanders, 'Octopus', originally slated for release in August, has been delayed until next January. "I know that's what the label wanted" he says, "but we're recording it in our own studio [their last album, 'Free the Bees', was recorded at Abby Road, in a salutary nod to one of The Bees more obvious of inspirations], and we'll say when it's ready". By way of compensation, he announces that some of the tracks have already found their way into the live set.

Whilst it's always been fun to listen to a Bees track and try to namecheck the elements (they vary hugely from classic British rock, Jazz, American soul, reggae and latin), what sets them apart from many of their cohorts is the fresh take that they've adopted with these sounds. Managing to avoid being derivative, what they do could be considered timeless, such is the effortless musical intuition behdind it.

So what's to be expected of the new album then? "It's a really good vent of our first records, taking all the good bits. We've still got a tropicalia influence, a little bit of reggae groove, or the roots of it anyway. It's got no instrumentals. It's quite fruity, and groovy but nicely different."

Speaking of different, on The Bees' debut LP (the mercury nominated 'Sunshine Hit Me'), they playfully covered a Brazilian samba-esque tune A Minha Menina. This time, they've gone one better, and written their own. "We wrote it in English then translated into Portuguese. A friend showed us the pronunciations. It's called 'The Ocularist', a maker of eyes, it's very psychedelic."

Quite. So if the role of the music press is to attempt to classify music into its multitude of genres, any chance of some help here? "I don't know. The Bees' motto is to keep people guessing, including ourselves. We've always been defined as uncategorizable. It's tough to describe what we sound like."