Firewater, the latest hit from Mark Sharp and his backing band The Bicycle Thieves, is a fun thing to break down.
We’re introduced to an echoing electric keyboard, a rallying drum, and reverberations leading up to Sharp’s haunting and powerful vocals. His emotional voice has a twinge of Bowie to it in the quieter parts, and transitions into a smoky and passionate tone for the chorus. The great thing about indie music being made today is all the influences that go into one song. Listening to this song and focusing on it, I can pick out 90’s grunge, 00’s soul pop, rock from this current generation…a lot of work and emotion has went into this song and it has not gone unnoticed.
There are a lot of levels to this song, each one contributing to the overall excellence. As the song progresses the mood shifts from epic and electric to upbeat and indie as a brilliant guitar track comes through for a heartfelt chorus. The lyrics dedicate a person losing themselves in the night, but it’s left unclarified if it is a separate person or the narrator themselves. Like I said, Firewater has been fun to break down.
Firewater captures that moment in a party/night out where the fun vaporises and you come down to earth, but everyone else is still in their feelings. It’s uniquely both a critique on excessive and uninhibited fun, and a celebration of it – the electric and rock cannot hide the grief in the vocals and lyrics, true, and that only emphasises the sadness more. There is a kind of emptiness in this song that the indie rock genre captures so well; but the electric tone rejuvenates the song and transforms it from a sad song to a poetic one. (Plus, this song will definitely get a crowd moving.)
This song is full of brilliant overlays with rock and electric, piano and electric keyboard, sadness and anger explained against an adrenalizing flow of instrumental backing…like a true piece of art, you cannot understand this song in just one listen. And what’s stopping you from listening again? There’s nothing about this band that I don’t like, and I think their own unique talents and talents as a group are displayed well in this track. I can’t wait to hear more.
Firewater by Mark Sharp and the Bicycle Thieves is available to stream on Spotify and Apple Music now.
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