Bear in Heaven
Beast Rest Forth Mouth
Rating: 4.0/5.0
Label: Hometapes
Bear in Heaven’s directionally-challenged second album, Beast Rest Forth Mouth, sneaks in at the end of a year that saw the rise of genres such as chill-wave, the resurgence of the confessional pop song a la Girls or the frosty move away from the day-glo feel-good sounds that populated the second half of this decade in favor of icy minimalism and stark beats. Yet, Bear in Heaven’s gauzy songs- short blasts of pop euphoria wrapped in diaphanous haze- could be as grandiloquent as any anthem by the Twilight Sad, yet Jon Philpot’s dreamy vocals defy any sense of posturing that would have made the album much less effective than the daydream that is so successfully peddled here.
True, Bear in Heaven have prog-leanings, something that may belie the band’s Southern roots, though that doesn’t the group can’t be economical. Clocking in at 10 songs in barely 40 minutes, Beast Rest Forth Mouth offers bite-sized pocket symphonies where the chorus is not only the key, but a payoff that builds up and over itself. Just check out “Ultimate Satisfaction” which escalates from a miasma of swirling guitars and synths to Philpot intoning, “From the top of my head/ I feel the feeling/ Coming down/ All over me/ Ultimate satisfaction.” Maybe it mimics the rise and fall of a drug trip, but by the time the song spits us out at its foggy, pulsing conclusion, we feel that same endorphin rush that Philpot is singing about.
While some have compared Bear in Heaven to Animal Collective, or even the loose experimentation of Can, it’s the foggy sensibility of shoegaze that envelops Philpot’s little pop numbers. “Dust Cloud” swirls by with Isn’t Anything abandon, while the primal percussion of Animal Collective could be referenced on “Drug a Wheel,” it’s ultimately the twitchy synths and side effects that could place the song with early Genesis or King Crimson.
However, unlike the cloudy distance shoegazers like to put between themselves and the audience, Bear in Heaven creates an emotional resonance with Beast Rest Forth Mouth that is difficult to extricate without feeling like a total sociopath. With tracks titled “Lovesick Teenagers” and “Deafening Love,” Bear in Heaven are not trying to turn their back on any emotional ties, yet are working out the lovesick kinks through the spectrum of synthesizer and fractured vocals. Imagine a less masochistic Brett Anderson filtered through the lens of shoegaze and you get the picture.
Beast Rest Forth Mouth may require a few listens before the hooks reach through the murk and pull you in. But underneath so many textured layers there is a romantic heart that has been perforated. Digging through so much good stuff to find that vulnerability is what makes this album so damned intriguing to play over and over again.
by David Harris
