Bear Witness Talks of Recent Works, New Music, and a Bit About Themselves

Alternative rockers Bear Witness, from the U.K. have released their most EP release titled "Dreams of Fame", with more music on the way! The band sat down to talk about this EP, new music, and themselves too!


1. Please tell us about the history of your band and its members.

The band was started in 2014 when me and Matt decided that we felt there was a lack of amazing rock bands around. We wanted to write music that was a mix of all our influences. We have always written music together and have been in many bands since we were young. The previous band we were a part of was falling apart for a number of reasons and forming Bear Witness was the natural progression to keep writing music. We had a hiatus due to university commitments in 2016, but following the addition of bassist Liam Mead in late 2018, we returned with our debut EP "Dreams of Fame".

2. What’s the origin of the band’s name?

Long time ago me and my brother Matt here, was hitchhikin' down a long and lonesome road. All of a sudden, there shined a shiny bear. In the middle of the road. And he said: "Name your band Bear Witness."  Well me and Matt, we looked at each other, and we each said. "Okay."

3. Where is the band based out of and what is your music scene like there? Are there any local bands you could recommend?

Two thirds of the band are from Worcester and to be honest the music scene around Worcester is pretty terrible, there's almost no venues around and there's not much going on full stop let alone anything music wise.

4. How would you describe your style?

I would describe our music as melodic chaos. We tend to have big melodic choruses mixed in with heavy riff oriented guitars. I think our style is definitely a blend of our musical influences, we love gritty rock songs with monstrous rhythms but on the other hand we also really enjoy well crafted melodies such as artists like Twenty One Pilots and Michael Jackson. I like to think the bands soul comes from Jeff Goldblums jazz piano playing haha.

5. What have you released so far and what can someone expect from your works?

Our latest EP was called "Dreams of Fame" and was released in February of this year. The main reason I would give for giving it a listen is that we work as hard as possible to ensure that the songs themselves are good. So whatever genre you're into, if you listen to it you will hopefully get some enjoyment out of it. One of the things we agree upon as a band is that we love artists that have a really varied catalog of songs and so we definitely try to keep each song different, almost like each song has its own personality.

6. Do you have any new music in the works?

We do indeed. We've been working pretty hard on a new EP that should come out at some point next year. All of the recording is done, the only thing left is the mixing and mastering it just needs a bit of that special polish that songs need to go from sounding good to amazing! We have also just announced the lead single for the EP, its called "Perfect Living" and is being released on the 18/01/2019 and man does it sound incredible!

7. How about playing shows and touring, have anything planned out?

We are planning on doing a release show when we release our 2nd EP, but at the moment we are just working to make the EP sound as good as it possibly can!

8. What plans do you have for the future as a band?

We're releasing our new single "Perfect Living" on the 18th of January next year. We're really excited about its release and the music video we've made for it is insane! Following that we'll be releasing a few more singles throughout the year and then an EP in the summer. But to be honest other than that we don't have too much of a plan, we just want to release great music and hope some people can identify with it and like what we're making. Then if at some point we could play in front a huge crowd that would be pretty awesome.

9. Where can we listen to your band and where can we buy your stuff?

Our "Dreams of Fame" EP and singles are available pretty much everywhere including Spotify and iTunes. As for merchandise you can buy, you can go to our bandcamp page where we have t-shirts and posters available. I suggest people go and check out the poster we got done, we know an absolutely awesome artist who does all of our stuff and the poster is just insane! Here's the link: https://bearwitnessband.bandcamp.com/merch/limited-edition-bear-witness-neon-solace-poster.

10. What is it you’d like a listener to remember the most when hearing your music for the first time?

One of the main things I'd love for them to think when hearing it is just the way some of my favorite bands have made me feel on the first listen. You come away from it thinking how cool and different the band are and wonder how you've never heard of them before. Whenever I hear a band that I really like for the first time there's almost this excitement that I get to go and listen to their other material. Basically I'd like people to want to listen to more than just one song and come back for more.