We know why you're here: You're in love with your best friend and are afraid of losing them because of it. No? Well, if it hasn't happened to you and, for some weird reason, you'd like to know what it feels like to be both broken-hearted and in love at the same time, indie-folk band Ben&Ben is here to answer your prayers with their latest single. "Lifetime" is coming out on June 4, so mark your calendars and prepare for some extreme feels!
The song is based on a YouTube comment that was posted on the band's music video for "Doors." Ben&Ben first posted about it on May 11 and they've been working since to make an entire piece about the story—all recorded by the nine-member band in their own houses. "Para siyang LDR band-life," jokes vocalist Paolo Guico in a virtual roundtable with the press.
"We didn't know that if only one of us [had] dared to make a move, a lifetime was waiting for us," wrote the YouTube commenter. It was a line that struck deep with the band—enough to have the Guico twins write the lyrics and the band to record the song while in quarantine.
It was the first time they had ever written based on somebody else's story, explained the Guicos. It was something different, as they usually wrote from their own perspectives. "Para mong kino-compare 'yong sinigang tsaka adobo," joked Paolo when asked to compare the two ways of writing. "'Yong kwento ng iba, what we do is we put a bit of ourselves in it," he added.
Thankfully—or, really, not so thankfully, the band does relate to the story of the YouTube comment. Except for keyboardist Patricia Lasaten, who cheekily says "As a Scorpio, hindi."
Recording the song while in quarantine was also a new experience for the band. They crept into their closets to get the best audio quality; ended up using bits of raw sounds like rain that wouldn't go away, and tried out a slew of different apps and gear just to get it right.
While tech definitely helped things move faster than normal, the fact that the band has been working together for so long was a huge factor for them to work as seamlessly as they did. "Kasi 'yong chemistry na 'yon is really something that took hours and hours to build upon," says percussionist Andrew de Pano.
And on whether we can expect more from the band even while in quarantine, well, the answer is a sure yes. The first few days were hard for the band but they came together and decided, "to embrace this new dynamic." said Paolo. "We're going to work towards [this track] leading to a new album but we're gonna do things differently and embrace this new set-up."
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