From Black Midi's Chaos to Acoustic Refinement
Cameron Picton, the former bassist of British art-rock provocateurs Black Midi, has embarked on a strikingly different musical journey with his new project, My New Band Believe. Their self-titled debut album represents a profound departure from the jump-cut chaos and maximalist intensity that defined Picton's previous work, instead embracing entirely acoustic instrumentation and a more melodic, direct approach to songwriting.
A Quiet Revolution Born from Black Midi's Finale
The seeds for this transformation were subtly planted on Black Midi's final album, Hellfire. Amidst that record's bewildering rock opera narrative—featuring exploding actors, bizarrely named army recruits, and relentless sonic assault—lay a quiet gem called Still. This sweetly lambent acoustic track, sung by Picton with understated guilelessness rather than frontman Geordie Greep's theatrical voices, offered a glimpse of an alternative path. It blended country influences with bucolic Canterbury prog elements, standing in stark contrast to the surrounding maelstrom of scrabbly riffs, free-blowing saxophones, and kitchen-sink instrumentation.
My New Band Believe's debut album can be understood as an extended exploration of the musical territory first mapped in Still. While Greep's 2024 solo debut The New Sound delivered the full Black Midi-esque smorgasbord of sudden genre leaps and Zappa-ish complexity, Picton has chosen restraint over extravagance.
The Acoustic Ensemble and Musical DNA
Recorded with an impressive roster of left-field and improvisation-friendly musicians—including veteran drummer Steve Noble of 80s post-punk hellraisers Rip Rig + Panic—the album builds its sound entirely from acoustic foundations. Fingerpicked guitar, double bass, piano, and percussion create live-sounding recordings that are augmented by sophisticated string arrangements.
The lyrical approach has similarly evolved. Black Midi's characteristic flights of grotesque fancy have largely been replaced by more direct, personal themes. Opener Target Practice retains a hint of the old band's dark humor with its revenge fantasy imagery, but subsequent tracks explore domestic contentment in Love Story (complete with cooking dinner sound effects) and reflections on fatherhood in Opposite Teacher.
Subtle Complexity and Restless Innovation
Despite its acoustic framework and melodic focus, My New Band Believe remains firmly in the realm of the artistically ambitious. From the dissonant turn in second track In the Blink of an Eye, it becomes clear that "understated" is a relative term when applied to Picton's work.
The songs maintain an episodic, structurally unconventional quality that reveals Picton's initial (though ultimately unaffordable) ambition to work with legendary arranger Van Dyke Parks. There's something of the fidgety restlessness of Parks's celebrated 1967 album Song Cycle in the material's unexpected key changes and mood shifts.
This is particularly evident in the eight-minute Heart of Darkness, which moves seamlessly between Pentangle-esque folk-jazz fusion, breezy acoustic soft rock, and a sparse, ominous coda of guitar harmonics and disconcerting string-like sounds. Similarly, Actress combines sweet folk-jazz melodies with pregnant pauses, tempo changes, and volume surges before exhausting itself into silence.
A More Accessible Yet Uncompromising Vision
What distinguishes My New Band Believe from Black Midi's work is not a reduction in musical ideas but rather their presentation. The constant sense of movement is contained within the acoustic instrumentation, and transitions occur with remarkable smoothness. The result is an album that feels less distant, less inclined toward showboating, and ultimately more lovable than merely admirable.
Picton's debut with My New Band Believe remains admirably unbound by standardized song structures and defies easy categorization. It teems with extraordinary musical ideas while wearing its intelligence more lightly than his previous work. This represents perhaps the smartest evolution of all: maintaining artistic complexity while creating space for emotional connection, proving that acoustic instrumentation can contain multitudes when guided by a restless, innovative musical mind.
