Tag: Be The Bear

Be The Bear – I Don’t Want To

“So I’m a bit ill at the minute, Tim, and…”

Tim: New pop song off a weirdly titled Swedish artist: apparently Christina used to dream a lot about bears as a kid, and realised this was because she wasn’t challenging her fears, and so now she is Being The Bear. Or rather, being Be The Bear, which is probably close enough.

Tom: I mean, this is not what I was expecting from you sending an artist with “Bear” in the name, but sure, okay, I’ll go with it.

Tim: What did you exp— you know what, never mind. The intro will remind you of Avicii’s Levels, the rest of the song entirely won’t.

Tim: WHAT A LOT OF FUN. Isn’t it fun? It’s fun.

Tom: It’s another song where the middle eight is the best bit! Which admittedly isn’t a great sign.

Tim: “Bring me the sun or my life will be over” is maybe a tad melodramatic, but given that it’s positively standard compared to my original mishearing of soap instead of sun, I’ve no issue. We’ve a lot of bright and sparkly music here, with similarly bright and sparkly lyrics; the ‘oh, oh-oh oh oh oh, oh-oh oh oh oh’ maaaay possibly become slightly repetitive, but with it being sung in a happy manner there’s not a huge amount to dislike about it.

Tom: So I’m a bit ill at the minute, Tim, and…

Tim: Ah. See, if you’re not feeling in a happy mood, and just feel irritable, then that may not apply. In fact I can see that if that were the case I may well find it just plain annoying.

Tom: Yes. To be fair, though, it actually didn’t irritate me until that weird childlike “don’t you block me”, or whatever she says, just before the final chorus. I heard that, and it was like a switch flipped in my head. Suddenly, yes, I was irritable.

Tim: Hmm. Still, right now I’m happy, so hooray for me!

Be The Bear – Erupt

“It keeps telegraphing changes that just don’t happen.”

Tom: The title of this post seems like a bizarre motivational slogan. Be the bear! Erupt! Ahem. Anyway.

Tim: Slight warning: it took me quite a while to be sure I wasn’t watching a John Lewis Christmas advert. But then it became obvious.

Tom: You know, I’ve never actually seen a John Lewis Christmas advert.

Tim: What?

Tom: But I know what you mean, here, at least.

Tim: Her actual name’s Christina and she’s off Gothenberg, but never mind that because that first chorus really is unusual, and a tad “oop, you broke the song”.

Tom: It surprised me, but I don’t think it full-on broke the song: either that, or I’m getting more used to changes of chorus like that.

Tim: I don’t say that because “aaagh, it’s different, blegh” (although that doesn’t help), but largely because of that build that comes up right at the very end. What with most pop now bringing along two full choruses, a vocal and an instrumental, it really did seem as though we were leading into a second half. As it is, straight back to second verse brings us way out. I get what it’s trying to do – sound unusual, stick out – I just don’t think it works quite as well as it ought to.

Tom: It’s almost like the “body language” of the song is a little off: it keeps telegraphing changes in momentum and instrumentation that just don’t happen. I wonder how much of that’s due to me expecting “normal” pop music — like a John Lewis Christmas advert — and how much is just because it is, genuinely, a bit off.

Tim: Quite possibly a bit of both. BUT, having said all that: everything after that is lovely. The build works throughout when the next chorus goes in the the rest of it, and the strings that gradually appear sound all sorts of lovely. So start me at 1:23, I’m laughing.