I’ve said it many times before, but it needs to be repeated often and loudly. There is a sweet spot between pop and rock music, a magical point, and a legendary secret sonic garden that combines the best of both genres. Find your way to that magical crossroads, and you will find yourself empowered to make music that is blessed with the infectiousness of the mainstream and the weight and swagger of rock’s sonic heights. You will find all the necessary ingredients to make music that is poised yet potent, groovesome yet full of grace, and melodic yet slightly on the muscular side.
The musicians that have gathered together to make such sacred music, music written specifically for the Bernd Bridges Show, seem more than aware of this, and Girl Behind the Mask would suggest that they have not only found their way to such a sonic crossroads but sold their soul to the melodic devil who awaits for them there.
There is an infectiousness born of such a neat blend of pop melodies, a slight rock swagger, not to mention hints of funk groove, and an inherent soulfulness. But there is a real depth to the song lyrically too.
It is to Japan that we look for the inspirations behind the song, incidentally where the Bernd Bridges Show airs, a country that has a tradition of wearing medical masks in public as a precautionary health measure which predates incidents such as the recent covid pandemic by more than a hundred years.
Play Girl Behind The Mask Video
And, more tantalisingly, it is a culture with the concept of “face,” a blend of reputation, social status, stature, influence, honour, and pride that acts as your public persona, which also serves as much as a mask as any physical trappings you might choose to hide behind.
The song comes in both English and German forms, has an excellent in-studio making of/performance video, and you’ll even find a couple of remixes, one given a light dance dusting, the other turned into an epic and anthemic, brooding, operatic take. And the icing on the cake is that it is sung by Bernd Bridges (Bernd Korz) himself. How cool is that?
Rock with melody? Pop with swagger? Groove with grit? Infectiousness with integrity? Take your pick.
