It hasn’t even been a year since the release of their debut album Everything Is Temporary, yet Melbourne’s Between You & Me have already blessed us with new music. Serving up their new single “Famous”, the band have dished up an offering that leans more into the group’s pop influences than the band have ever explored.
Infectious from its opening moments, everything about this song is probably going to get stuck in your head. From the opening guitar riff that’s bound to get your shoulders popping to the booming vocals of frontman Jake Wilson, there’s just something about “Famous”, that will have this track on repeat on Spotify accounts across the world.
Despite leaning into pop more than ever, “Famous”, still feels distinctly familiar as it takes what listeners have come to know and love about the pop-punk quintet before adding a sprinkle of finesse and just a tad more polish. Yet at its core, the song is still rough and angst-ridden as it revels in the childhood fantasy of making it in the big leagues.
Never a band to lack it, if you can’t hear the overwhelming confidence that radiates through Between You & Me in this song, there’s no doubt you’d be able to see it in the single’s accompanying music video. Paying homage to everybody from Beyoncé to The Beatles, I struggle to imagine a music video that I’ve enjoyed more.
“I wanna be the greatest. Where do I start?”
It emits a care-free attitude, shouting out that the band really don’t care what people might think of them because they’re just going to do their own thing. While on the very rare occasion some of the vocal effects feel a little overdone for my own liking, the ability to incorporate different elements of production that work for the most part, speaks volumes about the air of confidence currently surrounding this band.
Despite running for just over three minutes, the song can begin to feel slightly repetitive but there’s enough minor change as the song progresses to prevent it from ever becoming boring. Furthermore, even if the song structure is simple, it carries more than enough weight and holds no punches for those listening and that’s before we even talk about THAT ending.
Carrying a belting chorus, it’s the song’s closing 45 seconds that really turn into an immediate hit. Everything hits harder, from the vigorous screamed vocals that play into the underlying harmonies beautifully, to the explosive drums that set the foundation for punchy guitar and bass. If you weren’t sold yet, you will be by the time the song finishes.
BYAM want to be famous, they want to leave a mark, and with a few more songs like this it’s hard to imagine that that dream is very far off at all.
Photo of Between You & Me courtesy of Liam Davidson.
