Sometimes a song hits you in the stomach and leaves you with this queasy feeling. That’s Forget by Theo Bard, and frankly it’s genuinely terrifying. Emotions turned into torture, memories into wounds.
Forget sounds like BlackPlastic favourites Hugh if they were produced by James Blake - deep, emotional and melancholic vocals ride waves of heavy distorted electronic melody. The video creeps and drips and melts and falls apart in much the same way that those of us lost in love or who have lost love do. It’s bruisingly sincere and open, the tortuous moment of insomnia as you are confronted with the betrayal of an ex-love all too real. You can’t hear this and not know how horrendous the experience was.
And yet, Theo has survived. He must have, in order to write and record this song. And these feelings, they still hurt, but they will dull, with time. And the scars? They tell their own story.
I’ll give the final word to Bard himself, who describes what led to such a personal recording:
“Forget is a dark, raw confessional about a traumatic experience. I was still in love with my ex-girlfriend when a big group of our friends were going away on holiday together. I wanted to be part of it. She was going to be there with her new man, but I didn't want to miss out and anyway, there were lots of other people I could hang out with. I could give them a wide berth and it would be fine, right? One night I woke to the unmistakable sound of their voices coming through the wall. I tried to cover my ears, wanting more than anything to 'unhear' the sound, but it was too late. Completely upset and spun out, I left the next morning, returning to London as fast as I could. All I wanted was to forget what I'd heard and what it meant. At the time, I was pushing my music in the direction of a new sound, telling people my new music was 'melancholic electronic' and I realised how perfect the story was for the new vibe. Once I had the concept of the song in my head it came out so easily.”