Our Ten Favourite Bry Songs

Bry, our favourite Irish musician, has announced a new tour!

He was born as Brian, then became known as BriBry. Then, Bri, and, after intervention from God, he finally landed on Bry O’Reilly. No matter what calls himself, we adore his music. He manages to blend a delicious concoction of endearing lyrics, with catchy melodies, all served on a bed of his trademark indie Irish charm.

Earlier this year, he crushed our hearts by announcing his Bye Bye Bry tour. (We cried for days!) However, he’s now back with a new tour and the promise of fab new songs! To prepare ourselves, we’re counting down our top 10 Bry songs. Let’s go!

10. Sum Me Up

A YouTuber’s first video is notoriously embarrassing, but we think Bry should be incredibly proud of his first single, Sum Me Up. Yet, he somehow hates it.

Why is it on our list? Well, because only true fans prefer the old tunes! Joking aside, while Bry has grown as a person and musician since his 2011 debut, Sum Me Up is such a sweet song that could warm the coldest of hearts, with the sweet youthful naivety that only a young 2011 Bry could offer. It’s a fantastic introduction to his music and, to make it even better, greater things are yet to come!

9. Your Life Over Mine

“The irony of feeling small, when I am over six feet tall, had you sold on me.” What an adorable line, and it sold Bry to us too! Just one year separates Your Life Over Mine and Sum Me Up, and we can’t believe the progression. Not only has he moved out of the safety of every YouTube vlogger’s haven (the bedroom), but he’s also found himself a band! The result is a much bigger sound, teamed with a really catchy chorus. It’s a real jam!

It’s a landmark song that shows Bry’s transformation from a YouTube vlogger making videos in his bedroom to a real musician.

8. Care

Possibly the quintessential Bry song of the BriBry days? Starting with one of his signature, thought provoking lyrical hooks, Bry admits, “I’d be lying if I said I never thought of dying alone.”

It captures the fun and optimistic outlook that defines the BriBry days for us. How’s the video? Well, he has appeared to have solved his loneliness by hiring an entire street of people to dress him in the morning? We’re not sure whether we’ve interpreted the video correctly, but we do know that the song’s message has slightly dark undertones about being in a lopsided relationship.

7. Don’t Go Alone

This song marks the transition from when BriBry became Bry. Like with all coming of age stories, we couldn’t be prouder of his transformation! Being the first single of his debut album and the first with the financial backing of a record label, this song is big on every single level!

The fingerpicking guitar is gone, so are the cute lyrical hooks and barebones production. In their place is an electric (yes, electric!) guitar riff that builds into a huge anthemic chorus, which sounds so epic live! The music video too looked equally epic. Set in a gigantic aircraft hanger, Bry takes off his signature striped shirt and spreads his arms out, looking like he’s about to take off and take on the world. It’s quite the sight and that’s why it deserves a place on our list.

6. Disarm

Critic reviews and the opinion of peers are always important, but what’s more important is your own love, and that’s why Disarm has made it this far up this list! (Because it’s Bry’s fav)

Worryingly, we’re unsure whether Alfie Deyes likes it, for he’s described both the song and video as being, “sick”. Interesting… Even more worrying is what the (very) religious members of twenty one pilots think of the song. When touring with them in 2016, Bry admitted to mumbling the line, “I never worshipped to god.” However, all is forgiven because Evanna Lynch (yes, Luna Lovegood herself) makes an appearance in the video!

Disarm is actually a fabulous indie pop song that has great mainstream appeal, which is important because spreading the word of Bry is a very good thing indeed!

5. Fall In Place

Is it okay if we slow things down, because the beautifully melodic Fall In Place shows just how versatile Bry is as a songwriter. Yes, we know he’s great at cute little acoustic songs, as well as huge pop anthems, but with Fall In Place he set out to write a ballad and totally rocked it! (Not in a literal sense, obviously.)

The lyrics speak of the emotions of love one undergoes when having a child, which really resonated with older people, like his mum! Yup, that’s her favourite song from his debut album!

4. Astronauts

Few songs are able to induce both tears and nausea at the same time, but somehow Bry was able to do it with the fan favourite, Astronauts! Originally released in 2012 as a B-side to his single Staying Together, Astronauts became so popular that the B-side soon reached the awkward position of being more loved than the actual single. With the will of the people, it got remastered in 2014 and the already beautiful ballad somehow became even more so, as well as tear-inducing!

The music video, however, became infamous for another reason: nausea. The swooping freehand camera movements are quite uncomfortable to watch, but perhaps build up the emotions of the song even further. Silly controversies aside, it’s an incredible ballad and is perhaps one of his most anguished and beautiful vocal performances to date! We here at TenEighty HQ are all such huge fans of this song.

3. Adventure Time

We’re well aware we’ve already given Care the award for Most Quintessential Bry Song, but are we allowed to change our minds? If so, Adventure Time definitely deserves it. It’s an amazingly moving song that’s become a cult classic to the surprise of absolutely nobody. Bry is often best at his most vulnerable, and this track is him at his best! Both the music video and the melody depicts a song of sadness, and while the song does speak about his insecurities, there’s also so much hope and optimism for the future!

Hearing the song on YouTube is good, but imagine hearing Bry play it live, standing in the middle of the audience, with hundreds of people singing along. Let’s throw dodie in there too! This isn’t fantasy because it actually happened during his 2015 tour. Not many memories can hold up to the tear-inducing nature of these performances of Adventure Time, so we’ve got Bry to thank for giving that beautiful memory to thousands of people!

2. Burn

Skip forwards five years and it’s now 2018 and Bry is no longer the young, wide-eyed, slightly awkward indie musician from YouTube anymore. He’s been through and experienced a lot in those five years, and has transformed into a powerful and mature musician who is every bit as good as the usual bands in the acoustic-based alternative-pop scene, such as Snow Patrol, Travis or Coldplay.

The first song we’ve chosen from his 2018 Love Pop Suicide EP is Burn, an incredibly haunting, stripped back acoustic song that really shows how Bry has changed. Gone is the naivety, the optimism, the perspective from a young BriBry who had the whole world in front of him. He’s been through a lot of difficult times since then and we feel that in Burn. The imagery which Bry uses to describe his feeling of loss of someone is so incredibly vivid in lyrics, such as, “Cause you don’t light up a room, you set the thing on fire… But I’ll burn, yeah I’ll burn, I’ll burn out.”

This is the new Bry. He’s a bit older, sadder, and he’s incredible.

1. Miserable

Plato believed it was important to purge pent up emotions through the experience of a cathartic emotional overflow. As far as we know, Bry’s Miserable is the best way to experience a cathartic release in the form of music, and because of that, we are naming it as our favourite Bry song of all time!

As with Burn, Miserable is so incredibly different from the old Bry. Immediately, the lyrics, the mood of the music video and even Bry’s facial expressions are so dark and with none of the hope or optimism that defined his earlier style. Then the chorus kicks in, and, wow, what a chorus it is, “Hiding that we’re miserable, needy in a bitter love, with a wall between you and me.” The lyrics are so incredibly sad, and when sung in Bry’s falsetto voice, are simply heartbreaking.

Listening to the song for the first time is such a powerful and cathartic experience, and we recommend it to everyone.

So there you have it…

Our 10 favourite Bry song of all time! What did you think of our list? Do you think we left anything out? As you ponder this, we’re going to relisten to all these incredible songs, so we can belt out all the lyrics come May!

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