Tripla by Miki Berenyi Trio

A new chapter, a new-line-up, a newly minted sound; Miki Berenyi Trio’s debut album Tripla is a landmark record for its three creators: Miki Berenyi, KJ ‘Moose’ McKillop and Oliver Cherer. The album’s richly layered, imaginative and uniquely slanted strain of dream pop is an often euphoric and sometimes melancholic mix of guitars and electronica, fronted by Miki’s instantly recognisable vocal, overlaid with an often profound and sometimes abrasive or yearning view of the world.

The trio’s dynamic beauty is illustrated by the album’s lead single and opening track ‘8th Deadly Sin’, subtly influenced by dance music but equally driven by a shoegaze-y dynamic – a combination that has rarely been attempted, let alone accomplished with such finesse and a barrage of gorgeous hooks. The track is coupled with Moose’s eco-protesting lyric, or as he puts it, “the absolute disrespect for Mother Earth.” “D’you understand the mess we’re in?” Miki sings. “So what’s the plan, Action Man? / Silly boys / broken toys.”

Tripla’s second lead single ‘Big I Am’ is similarly fired, lacing choppier rhythms and guitar crunch – dream pop by way of Two Tone, perhaps - whilst Miki skewers the macho aggression unleashed by social media types such as Andrew Tate: “Throws his weight around, living a lie / Empty victory, stereotype, cliché masculine.”

Miki Berenyi Trio, or MB3 for short, is named after its lead singer – a direct way to convey the presence of the former singer/co-guitarist of Lush, and one of the most instantly recognisable faces of the ‘90s - but the songwriting is entirely a three-way collaboration, as the album title describes: acknowledging the mother tongue of Miki’s father, Tripla is Hungarian for ‘triple’.

Miki and Moose, who came of age during the era of shoegaze and Britpop in Lush and the equally beloved Moose respectively, arrived here from Piroshka, which the couple formed in 2017 with drummer Justin Welch (ex-Elastica) and bassist Mick Conroy (Modern English). When Mick broke his arm during the tour that followed Piroshka’s second album Love Drips And Gathers, in stepped Oliver, Justin’s bandmate in Aircooledl and an eclectic, roving solo artist, under aliases such as Dollboy and Gilroy Mere.

With Mick moving to America, and Justin swamped by session work and live duties for The Jesus & Mary Chain and The Pretenders, Piroshka was put on ice, before the Miki-Moose-Oliver trio came together to play a handful of Lush songs whilst promoting her hugely acclaimed memoir Fingers Crossed: How Music Saved Me From Success. A bout of songwriting sessions followed. “Nothing was planned,” Oliver recalls. “It was more of an organic process.”

Likewise, the gleaming, gliding MB3 sound. Minus a drummer, the trio incorporated drum machines behind Moose and Miki’s guitars and Oliver’s bass, which led to the addition of more electronic components. Freed too from the logistics of touring with a drumkit, MB3 have seized the chance to regularly play live, including support tours to Gang Of Four and Wedding Present (twice) plus regular headline shows, including summer 2024’s US dates, supported by post-punk legends Lol Tolhurst x Budgie.

Over time, Tripla’s songs and lyrics were road-tested and honed before the album was recorded in Oliver’s home studio in St Leonards and Miki/Moose’s rehearsal room in North London. Deciding an album needed to be as succinct as most of the song titles and the abbreviation MB3, they stopped at nine songs, which by sheer chance, featured three tracks initiated by each member: ‘’Gango’, ‘Hurricane’ and ‘Kinch’ (Miki), ‘8th Deadly Sin’, ‘A Different Girl’ and ‘Manu’ (Moose), ‘Vertigo’, ‘Big I Am’ and ‘Ubique’ (Oliver).

Working songtitles often stuck, like ‘Gango’, a juggernaut of a song in homage to Gang Of Four. “I really liked the way their songs have all these disparate parts that eventually come together, and that’s how ‘Gango’ was written,” Miki explains. The cinematic ‘Manu’ – with trumpet by Oliver - is named after two people that Moose met in quick succession; Miki named ‘Hurricane’, after the song ‘Hurricane Fighter Plane’ whilst envisaging a rockier track to counterbalance Tripla’s electronic leanings, though the finished version fits in with the album’s sculpted sound.

Like the two lead singles, the whole album confronts the traumas of modern life. Alongside ‘Big I Am’, ‘Gango’ laments the misogyny spread by social media. Scored for strings by Piroshka contributor (and Bella Union labelmate) Fiona Brice, ‘Ubique’ also addresses the social ills created online; “oversensitivity and solipsism,” says Miki, “when everyone thinks anything that happens in the world is a personal attack.”

More personal anxieties also come to light. On Moose’s side, ‘A Different Girl’ finds him hoping his and Miki’s daughter Stella has more opportunities to fulfil her dreams than he had. A lighter note is struck by ‘Manu’, his, “slightly tongue-in-cheek” lyric about learning from the poets: “They’ll tell us how to help us get through,” he says. “Or, read some fucking books!” On Miki’s side, ‘Vertigo’ documents her first experience of depression, triggered by the menopause, whilst ‘Kinch’ (Hungarian for ‘treasure’) encounters the dearly departed, including Miki’s father Ivan and Lush drummer Chris Acland. “It’s tricky finding things that you can write about at this age without sounding maudlin - or dull!” Miki notes. “But we are at that age.”

“But it’s not a depressing-sounding album at all,” Moose vouches. “A lot is really joyous.”

Tripla is completed by a superb mix by Paul Gregory (of Bella Union labelmates Lanterns On The Lake) and beautiful artwork by Chris Bigg - who designed the sleeves for Piroshka and contributed to all of Lush’s sleeves - incorporating photography from Martin Andersen. But for all the album’s heightened and sophisticated sound, MB3 have gone back to basics, not only recording at home but driving a car packed with their gear, loading in and out of venues themselves.

“There is something very ‘grass roots’ about what we’re doing,” says Miki. “There’s no point following the ‘announce the album, then tour, then record the next album’ route – we just want to wring as much enjoyment out of this as we can, and hope that it resonates somewhere!”

Miki Berenyi Trio are Miki Berenyi on vocals/guitar (Lush), Kevin ‘Moose’ McKillop on guitar (Moose) and Oliver Cherer (Gilroy Mere, Aircooled). The three musicians first worked together during Piroshka’s 2021 tour – Miki and Kevin being founder members, Oliver coming in on bass to replace Mick Conroy (Modern English) who had moved to the US.