Bicep release anthemic new single 'Water'

Bicep have released a new single titled ‘Water’, alongside a B-side cut ‘Waterfall’, via Ninja Tune.

The two-track outing marks the duo’s first new music since the release of their second album ‘Isles’ in early 2021.

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The track has already proved a hit in Bicep’s live show, featuring enchanting vocals from Clara La San, shuffling drums, cascading synths and a scuzzy bassline adding bite to the euphoric track.

‘Waterfall’ is a soaring instrumental that was an earlier version of ‘Water’, taking a gentler approach with the transcendent synth line at the forefront and providing insight into how Bicep’s writing process develops.

The tracks were initially written by experimenting with a synth that has the chips used for creating the sounds of SEGA Megadrive and Genesis games consoles.

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Speaking about the process, Bicep said: “There was no outright idea when we started, but the original ‘Waterfall’ was born out of experimentation with an instrument called the MEGAfm. It’s a new synth but has chips inside which formed the sounds of the SEGA Megadrive/Genesis games consoles. Weirdly it got more computer game sounding when we developed it into ‘Water’, speeding up and slowing down the lead line and LFOs to give that classic low-bit sound effect.

“We always like to be fluid with ideas and never stick to one direction, when we play live we develop tracks and constantly tweak and change elements and like to employ that process in the studio too. We work with Clara a lot and even from the early “Waterfall” demos we had vocal sounding pads in there which we had in mind for her to sing along with. Both “Water” and “Waterfall” have the same spine, but have two totally different directions in terms of how they finished up. It’s a common thing in the studio to start on one demo and go in different directions but end up liking both and not knowing which to choose.”

“We like both directions and think some people will like one over the other. When we ran the blog from time to time we would find original demos of famous songs released in the past and ended up preferring those. Sometimes the rawness in the original idea is nice to hear and can end up being appreciated in a totally different way.”

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Listen to the release below and get tickets for Bicep’s upcoming live dates here.

To listen to this audio clip, view the full mobile website.

Patrick Hinton is Mixmag's Editor & Digital Director, follow him on Twitter