Flick of the Finger

"Flick of the Finger" is the first song from British band Beady Eye's second album, BE, and the first song released from the album.^[3][4] Issued as a promotional single on 15 April 2013, it served as the opening track and first preview of the album's changed sound under producer Dave Sitek.^[5][6]

In April 2013, ShortList reported that "Flick of the Finger" derived from an old Liam Gallagher demo titled "Velvet Building". According to Gem Archer, the song had survived on cassette from the Oasis era and had briefly been considered for an aborted Oasis project with Death in Vegas in 2004 before being substantially rewritten for Beady Eye.^[7] The same report said that new lyrics by Archer and Andy Bell, a brass arrangement and a spoken-word section were added when the song was reworked for BE.^[7]

In Beady Eye's own track-by-track comments on the album, Liam Gallagher said: "We had to go first with it. I get a bit of an I Wanna Be Adored vibe", while Andy Bell compared the finished track to "a Gimme Shelter moment".^[8] Liam Gallagher later told The Quietus that Sitek had already started work on "Flick of the Finger" before the rest of the band arrived, and that hearing what he had done to the song helped convince them to let him push the record in a more adventurous direction.^[9]

The song features a guest appearance from Kayvan Novak, who reads out a passage from Tariq Ali's 1987 book Street Fighting Years: An Autobiography of the Sixties (in turn quoting a, likely fictional, Jean-Paul Marat monologue from act 1, scene 23 of Peter Weiss's 1963 play Marat/Sade) to close the track.^[10][7] Archer told ShortList that the band "needed to re-record it anyway" and that Novak had then been brought in for the spoken part.^[7]

The track debuted on Californian radio station KCRW on 4 April 2013.^[11] ShortList also reported that the song was due its first UK radio play on Zane Lowe's BBC Radio 1 show shortly before release.^[7] When Beady Eye formally announced BE on 10 April 2013, the song was already being presented as the album's first taster.^[12]

The music video for the song was made available to watch on the band's official website along with stems files as MP3s during the internet promotion. The stems were later released on Facebook and Twitter.^[13] Before the video's release, NME reported that Beady Eye had been filming at a Lancashire pub.^[14] The official music video premiered on YouTube on 11 April 2013.^[2]

The remix of "Flick of the Finger", backed with a remix of "Soul Love", was released as a 7" single limited to 1000 copies in 2014.^[15]

Critical response to "Flick of the Finger" was generally positive, though not unanimous. In its standalone review of the song, NME described it as "a call to arms that confirms Liam was born to lead".^[16] Reviewing BE, The Guardian listed it among the album's best moments and treated it as evidence that Beady Eye's attempt to move beyond their comfort zone could pay off.^[17]

Other reviewers focused on the song's arrangement. Hot Press called it "a brilliant opener" that sounded like "a psychedelic Oasis", highlighting its brass section and jazzy undertones.^[1] Pitchfork wrote that the horns laid over its "menacing introduction" added "a touch of spice" to the band's sound.^[18] The Quietus praised the track's "dark, horn-lit swirl" and "heavy, trouble-starting drums", but argued that the Novak monologue tipped into pretension.^[19]