The Bear Quartet
Eternity now
A West Side Fabrication
I'm convinced that alien DNA has somehow gotten into a bunch of Swedish musicians recently, and they may not know it. The very odd sounds and arrangements being generated by bands like The State of Floral Beings, The Knife and The Bear Quartet just can't be explained merely by saying "they're hard-working musicians and they're looking for new sounds." I defy anyone who listens to "Eternity now", the brand-new Bear Quartet CD, not to tell me that something not quite of this realm is driving the band. Holy smoke, is this thing wild and uncategorizable. I chuckled at a description of these guys online as "Sweden's most legendary pop band." What you hear on this CD bears only a tangential relationship to traditional "pop." Let's start with the mindblowing 21-minute centerpiece "Bear Quartet International Airport". This is one crazily brilliant, jaw-dropping track that kept me up half the night in awe. It starts with a jagged, killer guitar riff that burrows into your brain, ferocious drumming and an overall sense of sonic abandon before zigging and zagging through uncharted musical terrain. There are tempo shifts, just a snatch of weird vocals and a beautiful section where all the music sounds bowed (even though it's probably done on a synth). Honestly, this piece sounds like it's attempting to reinvent prog rock for the new millennium, and I'm not gonna argue against that. Thrilling stuff. Elsewhere, the short "Broken heart" and ultra-strange "The repairing of the Red Sea" utilize innovative pitch-shifting on the vocals, a technique used by Ween and Iceland's Eberg, but still in its infancy as far as the creative possibilities. It's a delight to find Bear Quartet exploring this sort of terrain. "Sailors" has a fairly simple rhythm track and synth, but then proceeds to alienate the general listening public (although not ME) with a high, moaning vocal that is clearly NOT the work of a band with record sales as their top priority. And there are several percussion-heavy tracks like "Where I cried," as well as a spooky ambient instrumental called "Peders forlat," which goes even further in making this platter hard to summarize. You can almost hear them laughing at the listener's expectations. Bear Quartet have made a dozen CDs and umpteen EPs over the years; "Eternity now" is clearly one of their weirdest and most delerious. Yes, that's a thumbs up.
- Kevin Renick
