Grizzly Bear
Friend EP
Warp, 2007
By Eva Bowering
Grizzly Bear’s Friend EP is a record I regret not having put on my best-of-2007 list, one of those gems you inevitably start cherishing soon after the new year. Released this past November, the so-called EP boasts 11 tracks by the Boston-based band, most transformed by their “friends,” other popular independents like Band Of Horses and CSS.
The EP manages to capture a side of the band that’s unlike anything else they’ve produced thus far. Instead of using the usual sprawling undertones, Friend captures them under a brand new microscope. It opens with a new version of “Alligator,” a song first introduced on their debut, Horn Of Plenty. This adaptation features Beirut and The Dirty Projectors and is definitely one my favourites, due to the orchestral styling added to it, and the way it weaves in and out from calm to thunderous clamour. We are then led into the Grizzly Bear cover of “He Hit Me (It Felt Like A Kiss),” the infamous single by The Crystals, based on Little Eva’s abusive relationship at the time. This tune (also covered by Courtney Love, who considered it a “nice feminist anthem”) is one of the other highlights on this album, as it completely dissects the original, turning it upside down and inside out. It firmly gets its point across, perhaps even more then The Crystals’ version.
What follows next is a variety of reworked originals, such as “Little Brother” and “Shift,” and more covers. Band Of Horses’ version of “Plans” is a caricature of sorts: they manage to create their very own mould of it. You’d never know this was a Grizzly Bear song originally from hearing this version only. The banjos and upbeat country style transform the otherwise bleak and moody rumble. Both CSS and Atlas Sound (the side project of Deerhoof’s Bradford Cox) take on “Knife,” Grizzly Bear’s most popular track, with unique results: CSS makes it danceable, while Atlas Sound turns it much more psychedelic.
The Friend EP is how cover records should be created. Most musicians rarely make a statement about their source material; they end up covering it as if they’re in some mediocre karaoke bar, only to reprise what we’ve heard a million times. That is exactly where this record differs from all the others: Grizzly Bear, and their associated friends, do it right.
