Based in San Francisco, The Bilinda Butchers consist of Michal Palmer, Adam Honingford, and Ryan Wansley, who derived their band name by referencing iconic shoegaze band My Bloody Valentine's second vocalist and guitarist Bilinda Butcher. Palmer and Honingford have described themselves as "sort of effeminate and soft-spoken and shy", and their sensitive introspection certainly comes through via the band's brand of lush, mellow and hazy dream-pop. Ian S. Port notes that The Bilinda Butchers are generally known for "machine beats, haze aplenty, dragging tempos, [and] vocals half-covered in the luxuriant vapors of a cheap synthesizer".
"Tulips" is a track from their EP regret love guilt dreams (2011), a lyrically minimalist track that explores the agonies of romantic failure:
'If I could release you What exactly would you have me do If only the wind could take me away Tulips all around and I feel okay I can walk alone in a sun that shines a different way I'm scared and I'm so far from home I hear it far away from a distant time I hear it far away from a distant time She said I don't give a shit about you
You're an outsider and we never liked you too Where do I go now? no one loves me Flowers all around, but I need the key I've got different friends all over, but you're the first one That I thought of to hold me I feel it all around from a distant time I feel it all around from a distant time'
The lyrics are barely audible, and are generally overpowered by the melodic, arresting chimes that keep the listener lost in this aimless, seductive dreamscape of luxuriant stasis. The band has been described as writing "songs that contrast idealistic nostalgia with romantic uncertainty and sorrow", and these themes certainly play out on "Tulips", wrapped in an alluring package of hazy, melancholic dreaminess.
