"Dry the Rain" is the opening track from Champion Versions, the Beta Band's debut EP released on limited-edition 12" vinyl in July 1997. It was later compiled on The Three E.P.'s, the critically acclaimed 1998 collection that brought the Scottish group to a wider audience.
The song was co-written by all five members - Steve Mason, Gordon Anderson, John Maclean, Robin Jones and Steve Duffield - but it grew from two very distinct halves with two very different emotional registers.
Co-vocalist Steve Mason wrote the song's first half while at a low ebb personally. "I was living in Streatham with a load of reactionary, borderline racist London mods who were driving me round the bend with their f---ing haircuts," he told Uncut magazine. "I was suffering from agoraphobia and depression. The lyrics: 'This is the definition of my life. Lying in bed in the sunlight. Choking on the vitamin tablet the doctor gave me...' sum up how I was living. It's really the feelings of a young man trapped by what's going on in his brain."
Keyboardist John Maclean told Uncut that on the original demo, "Dry the Rain" was half a song with no drums, just an acoustic lament to which Mason picked a groove from various samples. The line "Motts in the corner of the room" refers to a Mott the Hoople record that co-vocalist Gordon Anderson had given Mason when he was in Streatham, but which Mason hadn't listened to, so it sat in the corner of the room tormenting him. The phrase "Take me in, dry the rain" was Mason's cry for help.
After Mason fled Streatham and "muscled" his way into the two-bedroom Shepherd's Bush flat shared by Maclean and drummer Robin Jones, the redemptive second half of the song was supplied by Gordon Anderson, who was visiting from Scotland. As Mason recalled: "When we combined my sad half and his part - the redemption - it became this perfect song."
Anderson suggested the "If there's something inside that you wanna say. You can say it loud, it'll be OK" chorus-stop, which Mason believes Gordon may have proposed after hearing the song in its early, unfinished state.
Geoffrey Haslam, Shel Kagan, and The Beta Band produced the song. It's notable as the only Beta Band recording to feature both founding members Gordon Anderson and Steve Duffield, who departed before any subsequent releases.
"Dry the Rain" is considered the Beta Band's most accessible and best-known song, a comparatively straightforward blend of a British folk-rock, loose psychedelia, and sampler-driven lo-fi production, with none of the oddball turns that characterize much of the group's catalog. Mason's lyrics make literal emotional sense, and the song builds slowly into a genuinely lovely extended, trumpet-accented coda. As Uncut noted, it was "a startlingly fresh, gently anthemic mix of lo-fi and organic sounds, guitars and samplers" that prompted the likes of Noel Gallagher and Thom Yorke to aspire to making "Beta Band-like records."
Jonathan Levien, who met John Maclean at the Royal College of Art bar in 1997, played the trumpet solo on "Dry the Rain." Levien mentioned he could make interesting whale sounds on his trumpet and was promptly invited to Chalk Farm recording studios to play three riffs for the song.
Despite never charting as a single, the song developed a reputation in the UK as a minor classic. In the US, however, it remained largely under the radar until it was handed one of the most effective pieces of cinematic product placement in indie music history.
That moment arrived in High Fidelity, directed by Stephen Frears and starring John Cusack as a record shop owner with strong opinions. In a now-famous scene, Cusack's character confidently declares he is about to sell five copies of The Three E.P.'s, and drops the needle on "Dry the Rain." Within moments, a customer asks, "Who is this?" Rob replies: "The Beta Band." Customer: "It's good." Rob: "I know."
In real life, the effect was just as dramatic. After the film's release in 2000, sales of The Three E.P.'s reportedly quadrupled, turning "Dry the Rain" into the band's de facto signature song for a global audience.
