Ber is back. The Minnesota artist, who studied music in the UK, releases her new single Your Internet Sucks today. "Your Internet Sucks is an ode to the boy who broke my heart," says Ber. "I don’t wish him the worst, but I do wish him minor inconveniences. For example, when he’s playing Fortnite, I hope his internet sucks." It's this amusing, vulnerable honesty in Ber's songwriting that has had us playing recent singles Boys Who Kiss You In Their Car and Superspreader on repeat. In anticipation of the upcoming EP, Halfway, we went deep with Ber about creating the EP from a place in between heartbreak and happiness, and who inspires her songwriting:

Hi Ber! We are loving what we've heard of Halfway. The first three songs off of the upcoming EP are brilliant. You’ve said these songs come from a place in between heartbreak and happy… We love the idea of exploring that middle ground and having a soundtrack to that journey. Tell us a little more about being in that headspace and why it felt right to (loosely) form the EP around this concept?

"Hi! Thank you so much, I’m so excited you’re into it! I really can’t wait for this EP to be out, it’s really just a playlist of all of my current favourite songs, hearing you say that makes me so happy. I really wanted to dive in and explore the emotions that happen in that middle ground because that’s directly where I was when I had this project on my hands, it had been a year since a big break up for me when I wrote the title track ‘Halfway’ and I was still holding on to so much but at the same time I was so over being sad, and I’d been trying to move on from it for what felt like an eternity. Writing that song made me realise I actually had so much to say about the experiences I was having, as I was flirting, finding myself again, missing an old piece of me, it just made sense to touch on that with this EP, and every song feels like a different little era of my healing process from it all. The point of the EP is certainly that ‘halfway’ is where you ultimately end up, and learning to accept that things have changed is the only way to make that halfway point feel like home. I think it’s a messier EP than my last, it feels very candid and the songs are all very much drawn from hyper-specific situations and realisations from the last year of my life."

When and where did you create most of the EP?

"I wrote most of the EP in basements in Minnesota, though ‘Slutphase’ and ‘Over You’ both came from a really lovely stint spent in the UK. I love these songs because they don’t come from pretty studios with the best equipment where the views are of the beach, they come from basements where the heating is broken in cold places in a lot of DIY spaces where the only lighting is from string lights and your laptop screen. I wrote the EP with some of my best friends who really know me and this project feels like a time capsule for what my life has looked and felt like as a rather isolated Minnesotan really just trying to figure a lot out."

What is your writing process like? Do you have a specific place you love to write or somewhere that has conjured up something special?

"Weirdly enough I’ve written some of my favourite lyrics on the EP on long plane rides. The bridge in ‘Superspreader’, for example, I knew it needed one and I wrote that on a whim while on my way to Austin, Texas for SXSW, and it’s one of my favouarite moments of the EP. Lyrics are usually quite spontaneous for me, I like to work off of titles. I had the words “boys who kiss you in their cars” scribbled in my notes for about 6 months, laughing to myself every time I stumbled across it knowing fully well that that was a ridiculous title, but one day it came up in a session with my friends in Now Now and they were like “yep. We’re writing that today,” and I was like “cool”, so we joked about all the weird dates I’d been on this year and just very blatantly referenced them and I fell in love with the song. I’m not really a song-theme planner, where I know what I’m gonna say walking into something. With ‘halfway’, that came from me casually telling my friends that I felt like I was finally “halfway” through it, and immediately we were all like, well, halfway where? Halfway what? And the lyric in that song is just a whole love letter to myself full of things I had no idea I needed to hear or say. The lyrics on this EP are my therapy."

Who are some songwriters you are inspired by?

"Oh gosh. Holly Humberstone, Victoria Zaro (Ryann), Caroline Pennel, JP Saxe. I think Joni Mitchell is the blueprint and Maggie Rogers is a master of words and emotions and my friends in Now Now are gods when comes to following you instinct and I’m so lucky to have them so close to my brain on this EP. I also think Leith Ross is the next big lyricist of our generation, everything they sing breaks me into a million pieces and I feel it so deeply."

We especially love Boys Who Kiss You In Their Car - feels like we are all having the same experiences (lol). Tell us about that song and how it came to be?

"Haha, love that for us. As I mentioned, I think I had realised that of all the boys I was looking for something in while in my big dating/exploration phase of healing (necessary by the way imo), they were all a carbon copy of one another, they had bleached tips and were indie musicians that dressed like skaters and wore beanies and would make me listen to songs they wrote about their exes on their car speakers and they were “soooo cool” and the dates would be boring and at the end of the night they’d drop me off and kiss me in their car and it was bad and when I finally realised what I was doing and that I had a TYPE and I just missed my ex so I would succumb myself so these horrible dates to feel it all again (twisty, I know) annnnnnd it was just so underwhelming. So I wrote that line in my notes and sat on it until Brad and Cacie pulled it out of me, and we were able to laugh it all off. It’s kind of funny and kind of sad. When we wrote it though, it was just fun. We laughed about all of these stereotypes and I made their jaws drop when I’d describe certain dates and tell them stories."

Superspreader is so special - we love your attitude. We’d love to hear more about the creation of that song and those lyrics -  "you still ruin my life even though we don’t talk anymore".

"Ahhh thank you ! ‘Superspreader’ is one of my favourite songs I’ve ever written. I wrote that over zoom with one of my favorite co-writers from the UK, Geth, and we spent 8 hours on zoom that day just chatting and catching up and writing the verses and chorus. I wrote it without the EP in mind, it was just something I wanted and needed to say. That line you’re referencing is another that just sat in my notes for a long time, just waiting for me to figure out what it meant, and when we wrote it I was working 2 part time jobs, living in my uncles basement, and the hurt was so fresh.

'You still ruin my life even though we don’t talk anymore' just said so much every time I read it. I was thinking about my ex constantly, I was writing songs about him and this big horrible beast of a heartbreak, I was waiting for him to pick up the phone and call me, every time I met someone new I felt sad it was another person who met this new version of me, and not the version of me that felt whole and in love and happy, and it was consuming me because I let it, even though we hadn’t spoken in 6 months. It was a lack of closure that really inspired it. I finished it about 6 months later with Brad and Cacie, who I knew would help me breathe new life into it because I had some major demo-itis, I wrote the bridge on that plane, and after about 8 months of people bullying me on the internet to release it I was able to release it and give people some context for where and what version of me the EP comes from."

You’re from Minnesota but sounds like you’ve spent a lot of time in other places. Firstly - how has Minnesota influenced you - in terms of your musicality/writing? Is it inspiring you more so in recent times? (Thinking of that lyric in Superspreader).

"More so in recent times, yes! especially lyrically, haha. I like to write about what is right in front of me, and Minnesota has become a bit of a brand, which makes sense because I was really lost when I came home from the UK, but I’ve found so much of myself here in the last 2 years.  Recently I’ve been diving further into the music scene here, which is indie and rough around the edges and definitely feels like it comes from this city. There’s some insane talent here, and in the last year I’ve begun collaborating with people here much more than when I moved, as I’ll admit I struggled to meet anyone and just stuck to zoom. Those collaborations though have helped me take my sound to a place I’ve always wanted to go, and I think this project is a good example of that."

You’ve spent a lot of time in the UK and we’ve read you were a musical theatre lover. Favourite musical theatre score?

"Yes! I did my degree in the UK and I loved it. I saw a few shows on The West End while I was there which was my dream come true, but my favourite score at the moment may be Waitress (I am just obsessed) and The Book of Mormon will always sit very high atop the list for its brilliant lyricism and outrageous story. I’ve seen it 3 times and cried from laughter each time. Outside of the more contemporary musicals, I always dreamed of playing Éponine in Les MIs (dream role). So tragic."

How do you think being so involved in that space has influenced your pop music making?

"I think it’s really influenced my storytelling and lyricism, which I think makes sense because it’s what I grew up singing and surrounding myself in and I love when a song tells you a full story."

Obviously genres can be bent and you have such a beautiful voice. Do you see yourself making more folk-y music like you have listened to in the past?

"Yes! Absolutely! I feel really fortunate to be in the space right now where I don’t feel confined to stick to one genre for my project, my team gets excited every time I experiment, and I think staying in one lane is sort of moving out of fashion. I would absolutely love to write a really hearty, folk EP with a banjo and mandolin and heartbreaking lyrics. And I’d like to write it with my friends. I’m sure it will happen."

Who have you worked with who has really lit you up and expanded the Ber universe?

"NOW NOW. In all caps. Brad and Cacie altered my brain chemistry the second they opened their world up to me. I really admire their work and look up to them and they make me laugh and feel so seen and I love working with them. Other people that completely opened me up are Caroline Pennel and Lauren Aquilina, my gosh these two are brilliant and the world is figuring that out and I’m so happy. They really (and on accident) taught me how to take up space and tell stories and I’m so honoured they were keen to write for this EP, as they’re two of my favourite artists in their own right as well. And my day-1 best friend in music, Hot Dennis, built up this sound and project with me, we met in college and he spent almost every day in 2021 on zoom with me while we kept each other company and wrote songs that became my first EP."

Who would you still love to work with? Dream collaborations?

"Sza! Phoebe Bridgers, Adam Melchor, Still Woozy, JP Saxe, Harry Styles, the list goes on…"

What was the highlight of 2022 for you?

"There were so many, but I think performing with the Farm Band at Barn on The Farm in the UK was so surreal that I’ll never forget it. It was so cool to meet and sing ‘Meant To Be’ alongside so many of my favourite artists, the opportunity was wild and imposter-syndrome inducing and really opened my eyes to just how far we’ve come since graduating from Leeds College of Music in 2020."

Halfway, the EP, comes out soon. How do you hope people feel listening to the project in full?

"Seen!"

What’s next for you? (Aside from the EP!)

"A headline tour, a new era of writing towards another body of work, maybe spending some more time in LA and the UK, and hopefully just a lot of performing and connecting with an audience, it’s my favourite part."

Listen to the new single from Ber, HERE.

@heythereitsber