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Alt-rockers Bear Culture celebrate diversity on debut album

SINGAPORE — Keen observers of the Singapore indie music scene might be reasonably familiar with alternative rockers Bear Culture. Formed by students of Republic Polytechnic, the quintet earned a decent enough profile playing at various events such as Baybeats Festival, NOISE Singapore and the Asian Music Festival back in 2011, before performing a hat-trick of shows at their school’s IGNITE Festival for the next three years.

Bear Culture's new album will be available for download this weekend.

Bear Culture's new album will be available for download this weekend.

SINGAPORE — Keen observers of the Singapore indie music scene might be reasonably familiar with alternative rockers Bear Culture. Formed by students of Republic Polytechnic, the quintet earned a decent enough profile playing at various events such as Baybeats Festival, NOISE Singapore and the Asian Music Festival back in 2011, before performing a hat-trick of shows at their school’s IGNITE Festival for the next three years.

It’s nonetheless fair to say the band — comprising Nur Amira binte Khairil Anuar (vocals), Jayme Lim Hui Min (lead guitar), Muhammad Shahrin Syazwan (second guitar), Muhammad Khair bin Safaruan (bass guitar) and Niki Koh Zheng Hao (drums) — has been somewhat under the radar. But that’s all about to change when they launch their eponymous debut on Sunday at the Esplanade Theatre Studio.

Fans of the heavier aspects of alternative rock will find much to savour on this 11-track debut with its attention to technical virtuosity, diverse lyrical subjects and melodic finesse. The songwriting is evidence of the wide-ranging listening habits of the band, from the progressive metal thrust of Premonition and Little Bastard to the radio-friendly alt-pop leanings of Timeless and Flow. We spoke to guitarist Shahrin Syazwan to find out more about this intriguing band.

Q: Can you explain what each member brings to the band?

A: Jayme brings organisational efficiency and most of the music, Amira writes the lyrics, I do a little bit of both song writing and lyric writing, while Khair and Niki both work in tandem to turn simple parts into complex rhythms.

Q: What were the challenges in writing, recording and producing the album?

A: Musically speaking, we were more or less happy with the initial ideas, but pre-production recording made us notice parts that were not impressive enough so that pushed us to be more creative. The biggest challenge though was National Service, which took a massive toll on the time that could be spent writing or recording. But we did not let it get in our way.

Q: The material on the album is very diverse stylistically. Why?

A: The diverse style was not really a conscious decision. We just wrote whatever we felt like writing. Perhaps it could be explained by each member having very different musical tastes, ranging from Blink-182 to Justin Timberlake and many different bands and artists in-between.

Q: In the middle of the album, there are a couple of songs, Timeless and Flow, that seem to deviate from the heavy rock of the opening tracks. Were these songs made for radio airplay?

A: We realised that the songs were suitable for radio after writing them. We wrote these songs mainly to give the listener a break from the heavy, busy instrumentations of the opening tracks and to let Amira’s vocals shine through. It is important to have songs suitable for radio as they can open many doors and invite many new listeners to your music.

Q: There is also a deliberate attempt to present the album as a whole — one song segues into the next. Can you explain the decision?

A: This idea was inspired by many bands we’ve previously listened to. We have always felt that an album presented as a whole would be the best way to represent what the artist is about, rather than a single song.

Q: Any plans to tour overseas in support of the album?

A: At the moment, our tour manager has not finalised the details of our tour yet so I’m afraid I cannot divulge too many details in case they are not finalised. We have secured a show in China and KL at the moment and more details will be available once we’ve finalised the whole tour!

Q: What do you hope to achieve with this album and what would need to happen in order for you to deem the album a success.

A: We hope to achieve world domination! But in all seriousness, we just hope to tour as much as possible to promote the album and spread our craft worldwide.

Tickets for the concert on Sunday are available from http://bearculture.peatix.com/. The album will also be available on iTunes and Bandcamp starting today.

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