From the moment I heard it, I was obsessed. Big Bears is the first Chaser Anthem of consequence and Tom Tales is the first Chaser Icon performer of consequence in the scene which really contains multitudes more nuance and complexity in its play of archetypes other than one type of men pursuing other hairy men ad infinitum.
There is a lot of humor but also a lot of sincerity in Tom Tales’ lyrical stance in this song, as well as a singularly sleazy ‘new elegance’ in the electric pulse of the track he produced. In addition, it is all so perfectly pitched to the environment in which the video was filmed – New York City’s Rockbar where the guys are historically ready to mate. He captures and stokes up the mixture of hormones that gives bears and bear chasers a particular affinity — horniness and tenderness, kinkiness and romance, the safety in domesticity, and the sexual adventure in barely restrained wildness.
The tour de force of the full video is yet to be released but in this exquisitely stylized lyric video for Big Bears, Tom and his director friend Sean Breikreutz really distill the influence, key to the Tom Tales aesthetic and mystique of New York Nightlife-inculcated ‘New Elegance,’ of Andy Warhol’s cover for Sticky Fingers, now overrun with Big, Big Bears…