Bee Sides

 Songs about bees, or from the perspective of a bee

It's wonderful to be alive

To be a bee in this beehive

It's tough as nails, it's smooth as silk

It's milk and honey, without milk

I work with flowers, it's my work

From this, there's no way that I can shirk

No-no-no-no-no, there is no complex philosophy

It's just because I'm a bee

Unlike the skunk, I do not smell

But I have a thing and it stings like hell

As heroes go, I'm unsung

But step on me and you'll get stung

You'll get stung

The cutest bee I've ever seen

Is our own big, fat sexy queen

It's true she hasn't got such great legs

But you should see the girl lay eggs

It's wonderful to be a bee

Although there are billions just like me

This hive of mine, I call it home

There is no place like comb sweet comb

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Busy bee

Buzzing all day long

What's the hurry?

There's surely something wrong

I can't rest while the sun and the stars are so bright

'Cause your friends are picking flowers

Take away all my light

But you see busy bee

It's all for love

People pick them

You lick them all for love

Lalalalala...

She was a virgin, of humble origin

She knew of no sin

Her eyes as bright as the stars without light

We spent all the night

Prototype versions

I always associate Tintern Abbey with their contemporaries The Virgin Sleep, whose "Secret" , I just noticed, contains a reference to "the queen of the bees" - alongside many other creatures of the field, all hip to some kind of pantheistic-pastoral gnosis that the singer's sworn not to disclose. 

Partly it's the "virgin" thing as in "she was a virgin of humble origin / she knew of no sin", but also the general bucolic-psychedelic vibe and the connection to children's storybook anthropomorphism (Wind in the Willows, Dr. Doolittle et al).

The willow tree by the wishing well

Saw the fireflies dance but he won't tell

It's a secret he'll keep but he knows very well

I know

The field mouse runs from his nest by the road

To tell the news to the friendly toad

They think they're the only ones that know

But I know

I know 'cause I was there

Having my tea with a teddy bear

I won't tell, I wouldn't dare

'Cause I promised

Dragonflies tell it to the trees

Butterflies hear it in the breeze

They go tell it to the queen of the bees

Now she knows

Ask the wizard or the wise old owl

Or the badger though he's not in the crowd

They don't know anyhow

But I do

I know and so does the swan

He knows what's going on

He won't tell you just as long

As I'm here

The blackbirds talking in the trees

Tell the seagull who flies the seas

The sparrow hawk knows but then he sees

Everything

Spider spinning his web of silk

Watching the ducks down by the mill

He'll keep the secret

Until he's ready

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A "setting" of a poem by Larry Beckett

I am a bee out in the fields of winter

And though I memorized the slope of water,

Oblivion carries me on his shoulder:

Beyond the suns I speak and circuits shiver,

But though I shout the wisdom of the maps,

I am a salmon in the ring shape river.

Composer's Notes. Harmonic structure: a set of horizontal vocal lines

is improvised in at least three ranges, the vertical effect

of which is atonal tone clusters and arhythmic counterpoint.

Performance: the written melody is to be sung, after which

the lines of lyric are to be reordered at will and sung

to improvised melody, taking advantage of the opportunity

for quartertones, third note lengths, and flexible tempo.

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That Tim Buckley voicescape  is one of my absolute all-time gobsmacking mind-blown forever favorites....  Don't know why it's not more celebrated or talked-about. Easily the equal of equivalent things done at this time by your Nonos and Parmegianis. 

(In a class I did on experimental vocals, I played "Stairsailor" and another song from the album - "Jungle Fire" or maybe "I Woke Up" - plus the most unloosed erotomanic-glossalalic sections of "Get On Top" and "Devil Eyes" from Greetings from LA.  This class was the prototype for a whole course I later did called "The Elastic Voice". I really thought the students would be utterly blown away by Buckley but they reacted oddly - seemed to find his voice grating. One said they felt his singing style wasn't properly "supported" - i.e. he'd never had formal instruction in how to use his voice properly and safely, and consequently was audibly damaging his vocal cords, would soon get nodules. This what made them feel uncomfortable, as trained singers themselves - they could feel what it would mean physically to produce such sounds)

Tintern Abbey... again, one of my favorites pieces of music ever. Just the cymbal sound alone - it always makes me picture pollen motes in a woodland clearing, irradiated by sunlight streaming through the leafy canopy.  Now which Brit invented that style of broken drumming? Does it come from Ringo on "Rain" and "Tomorrow Never Knows"? Love the Wordsworth reference of the group's name - a foundational poem of English Romanticism and pastoral pantheism. Kinda amazing that Tintern Abbey never made it, during that long moment of "Itchycoo Park" and "Hole In My Shoe". Astounding also that "Bee Side"  was the literal B-side (good joke!) of "Vacuum Cleaner", another sublime Britpsych classic (if oddly titled - I have no idea why!). I believe this was Tintern Abbey's sole single. Indeed the group's only release during their own lifetime.  Much much later  an album of bits and bobs - unreleased recordings - came out in 2021 with the title Beeside: The Complete Recordings, but sadly nothing else really approaches the heights of "Bee Side" and "Vacuum Cleaner".

Loudon Wainwright III - I remember him being a Peel favorite, sticking out like a sore thumb amidst the postpunk and the outright punk-punk and the reggae etc.... but amusing / intriguing even then.  Somehow I've never got around to "doing" him until now. "Bee Side" is a clever, droll, imaginative tune. But not as clever, droll, imaginative or consternating as "Rufus Is A Tit Man". What can it be like walking around as a performer/singer-songwriter yourself and knowing your Dad wrote that about baby you?  

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Not really a song about bees

Great guitar playing, beamed straight across time from San Francisco circa 1968

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There's a fuckload more songs about bees or that reference bees - Stones's 'I'm A King Bee" to name only the most obvious.

Now I'm surprised I didn't remember this one though without the Google search

Surprised also I didn't remember this, having once been a Python obsessive 

Released as a single, that was.

This one throws in a bonus insect

Oops, another one - although this is not literally about bees, it's a saucy metaphor, amid a whole nest of downright dirty metaphors 

Yellow jacket buzz let's honey do

I'll lie down on top of you

Gonna split this womb in two

Haunted hive I'm comin' through

Sting me queen me

Queen sting dream me

Dream queen sting me

Sting queen

What's that growin' in my head

Worker bees, work her bed

I'm driving nails into your mattress head

I'm driving and I'm pumping red

Sting me queen me

Queen sting dream me

Dream queen sting me

Sting queen

Leave some honey

Drippy runny

On your tummy

Rich and yummy

Bee hive in a haunted house

Laying eggs inside my mouth

Gimme something to wash it out

Pour that honey down my throat

Sting me queen me

Queen sting dream me

Dream queen sting me

Sting queen

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update - more Bee Sides, some I remembered myself and others suggested by Commenters

I think DJ Hype had some hand in this track by The Scientist - "The Bee"

And the Honeycombe Remix

Mercury Rev - "Chasing A Bee"

From his back-to-childhood phase Jonathan Richman - "Buzz,Buzz,Buzz"

Warpaint - "Bees"

"Queen B" by the charmingly named Puscifer (project of Tool singer Maynard)

Controlled Bleeding - "Bees"

As for related terms like "honey" and "swarm" - I am not opening up that can of bees

Oh, inadvertently reminded myself of the Soft Boys record 

unconnected wasp-based dystopia-castrophe s.f.