The Art Bears' music was often deeply political in content, reflecting the bands' socialist leanings, and frequently experimental. Art Bears were more "song oriented" than Henry Cow, although much of the material that comprised their debut album release was actually written with the intention of being performed by Henry Cow.
Art Bears were formed during the recording of Henry Cow's last album after disagreements arose over the album's content. Frith and Cutler favoured song-oriented material, while others in the band wanted instrumental compositions. As a compromise, Frith, Cutler and Krause agreed, early in 1978, to release the songs already created on their own album, Hopes and Fears, under the name Art Bears, with the rest of Henry Cow credited as guests. The instrumental material appeared later on the final Henry Cow album, Western Culture (1979).
Hopes and Fears (1978) thus consisted of Henry Cow songs plus new Art Bears material recorded later by Frith, Cutler and Krause to complete the album. Towards the end of 1978, Art Bears returned to the studio to record their first "true" album, Winter Songs (1979). It comprised fourteen short songs composed by Frith around texts by Cutler that were based on carvings on the stylobate of the Amiens Cathedral in France.
In December 1978, Art Bears joined Rock in Opposition (RIO), and toured Europe in April and May 1979. For the tour, they added Peter Blegvad (ex-Slapp Happy, guitar, bass guitar, voice) and Marc Hollander (Aksak Maboul, keyboards, clarinet) to their line-up, and rehearsed at the Cold Storage Recording Studios in Brixton, London before leaving for Italy in late April. They performed in Italy, France, Belgium and Czechoslovakia, including an RIO festival on the 1st of May in Milan. Some of the songs recorded during the tour were later added to the album release of Hopes and Fears and The Art Box (2003), a box set of Art Bears material.
The band returned to the studio in 1980 to make one final album, The World as It Is Today (1981), before splitting up. In October 1983 Frith, Cutler and Krause reunited again, this time with Heiner Goebbels and Alfred Harth from Cassiber, Tom Cora and from Skeleton Crew, and George Lewis from the ICP Orchestra under the name "Duck and Cover". The ensemble was initially commissioned for the 1983 Moers Festival at the request of festival director Burkhard Hennen to Alfred Harth, but the group only materialised later that year after another commission by the Berlin Jazz Festival. "Duck and Cover" performed a 40-minute musical piece entitled "Berlin Programme" at the Berlin Jazz Festival in October 1983 in West Berlin, and again at the Festival des Politischen Liedes (Festival of Political Song) in East Berlin in February 1984. The second performance was recorded by Rundfunk der DDR (East German Radio) and broadcast nationally. An edited version of the broadcast was released in September 1985 on one side of the "Rē Records Quarterly Vol.1 No.2" LP record. In 1993 Frith, Cutler and Krause worked together again on a song project, "Domestic Stories" (1993) by Chris Cutler and Lutz Glandien, with saxophonist Alfred Harth. While similar to Art Bears, the addition of Glandien's electronic music made "Domestic Stories" a distinctly different album.
An Art Bears "review" took place in May 2008 at the world premiere of the Art Bears Songbook at the 25th Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville in Victoriaville, Quebec, Canada. It was performed by Cutler (drums), Frith (guitar, bass guitar, violin, piano), Jewlia Eisenberg (voice), Carla Kihlstedt (violin, voice), Zeena Parkins (keyboards, accordion), Kristin Slipp (voice) and The Norman Conquest (sound manipulation). Krause had been unable to participate and Frith and Cutler decided to rework the trio's repertoire for an expanded group, with the voices of Eisenberg, Slipp and Kihlstedt replacing Krause's "eccentric and idiomatic delivery". The project was so-named because Frith and Cutler did not want it to be seen as an Art Bears reunion. According to All About Jazz the Art Bears Songbook was "not just a highlight, but the highlight of the [five day] festival."
The Winter Wheel
Art Bears Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
In the driving
Snow
Upon a
Wheel a
Cockerel crows the
Crimson dawn
Like giant
Spokes
The barren fields
Contain
The pitiless
Winter in their icy
Arms:
Black winter's wheel,
Whose rim is heaven –
And whose hub is
Where each
Stands alone.
The Art Bears' song "The Winter Wheel" is a poignant reflection on the bleakness and isolation of winter. The opening line describes a fence leaning in the driving snow, suggesting that the landscape is barren and deserted. The next line introduces a striking image of a cockerel crowing at dawn, standing upon a wheel. The wheel is a powerful symbol in the song, representing the cyclical nature of time and the inevitability of change.
The third stanza describes the barren fields containing winter in their icy arms, suggesting that the winter is a force to be reckoned with, one that is pitiless and unforgiving. The final stanza is perhaps the most powerful, describing the titular winter wheel. The wheel has a rim that is heaven, but its hub is where each individual stands alone. This line encapsulates the song's central theme, which is the isolation and loneliness we might feel during winter, as we navigate the unpredictable and often harsh nature of the season.
Overall, "The Winter Wheel" is a beautifully written and deeply introspective song that offers a powerful meditation on the relationship between the individual and the natural world.
Line by Line Meaning
A fence leans
In the driving
Snow
The snow falls hard and fierce that a fence struggles and droops under its weight.
Upon a
Wheel a
Cockerel crows the
Crimson dawn
As the freezing morning sun rises, it illuminates the outline of a rooster perched on a wheel.
Like giant
Spokes
The barren fields
Contain
The pitiless
Winter in their icy
Arms:
The vast open fields with prevalent frost look like huge spokes of a wheel holding and enduring the harsh winter.
Black winter's wheel,
The symbol of black winter, a wheel, continues to roll on.
Whose rim is heaven –
And whose hub is
Where each
Stands alone.
The circumference of the wheel represents the vastness and mystery of the afterlife, and its centre is in the place where we stand alone and our soul takes flight.
Contributed by Lincoln N. Suggest a correction in the comments below.
terrypussypower
This album rocks! Art Bears rule.
Talia Ravensinger
I need to go looking for more of these great esoteric bands and music online. Nice to hear this after all these years. LOVED Art Bears and esp this album. Time to google Lemon Kittens now.....
Philippe Cirse
Art Bears was like Picasso: a phenomenal technique at the service of the most unbridled and fairytale abstraction !
Mehefinheulog1
have always seen them as more like Kankdinsky! but yes, a bit George Braque now and and again :)
MeloLand
Amazing!!
Generic Noone
Jesus this sounds like the Residents.. (And I love it!)
Reg Hunt Music
This was originally released on Ralph Records.
terrypussypower
Generic Noone Well, to be fair it doesn’t really sound anything like the Ressy’s!
Not in the least. But I kinda know what you’re getting at.
They’re both so left field they’re out in the wilds!
Rhon243243243
Well hell, ecxuse everybody I'm drinking & can't even spell, but well hell was funny, far too few comments about Art Bears, it's a great band, especially Winter Songs it's a fine record..