Bellman 🇳🇴 - She’s Reading Poe (single)

Have you ever vibed to a song you wonder how it would sound when you listen to it whilst engulfed in a ‘shroom cloud?* I know that’s a wild intro but there’s no holding back to how I feel about Bellman’s “She’s Reading Poe”. Whilst we would obviously never encourage drugs, “She’s Reading Poe” kinda lures you into an immersive five…no, six-dimensional experience that makes you think the other way around anyway.

The emergence of many new alternative bands makes shoegaze sound common. But when the soundscape is a perfect combination of all the good things: dreampop, indie pop, shoegaze, and raw emotions, you just feel human.

At first listen, “She’s Reading Poe” feels like you’re half-awake and trying to hold onto a dream before it slips. “I’m on a cardboard ceiling” is such a strange image, but it immediately makes the world feel fragile. Temporary. Almost handmade. The lyrics drift between detachment and quiet longing, especially in lines like “Unless my heart gets broken / There’s nothing to say”. It feels like someone bracing themselves for impact, as if heartbreak is the only thing that might make things real.

And then there’s Julie reading Poe. That detail lingers. It adds this gothic undercurrent, a

romantic darkness tucked inside something otherwise light and airy. It all feels nostalgic

without being sentimental. Listeners might think, “Who’s Julie?” but that’s kind of the mystery of the song. When the chorus repeats “We live another day” it doesn’t sound triumphant. It sounds gentle. Like survival. Like waking up and choosing to continue, even if everything still feels slightly surreal.

However, I’m not going to dig too deep into the lyrics and push more about the multi-faceted layers of the melody. Some musicians, like Bellman, seem to operate on a melodic wavelength that carries more emotion than the words themselves. The phrasing, the tone, the atmosphere do so much of the storytelling that even the simplest or random lines feel intentional and artistic.

With songs like this, I don’t find myself dissecting every lyric. It feels less about decoding

meaning and more about absorbing texture. The art isn’t always in what is being said, but in how it sounds, how it moves, and how it lingers after it ends.

Release Date: 30th January

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*editors note. Harri has inadvertently stumbled on something worth mentioning here. The new album from Swedish psych band Shroom Cloud was actually released last month. Entitled 'Mychphagic Transcendance'(nope, I’ve no idea either…) the lead track is worthy of mention simply for its title ‘Wicked Wizard of the Weedabyss’.