Roly Poly Rag Bear -- Sentimental Bus

 

This sci-fi comedy movie "Project Hail Mary" with Ryan Gosling has crept into theatres fairly meekly but it's been doing pretty good box office thus far. Strangely enough and rarely enough, I'm currently reading the original novel just before I head off to slumber each night, and I may actually watch the movie for comparison's sake. The overarching theme here is friendship between two beings despite vast differences due to a common goal.

Things aren't quite as high-stakes and dramatic within the adorable music video for indies pop and shoegaze band Roly Poly Rag Bear's "Sentimental Bus", but it shares the theme of friendship among a couple of stuffed animals and a human. "Sentimental Bus" is a track from the duo's 2004 album "Straw, Water, Pinstripe" and the melody is about as comfortable as a warm blanket and/or a hot bowl of soup on a cold winter day.

I couldn't find much information about Roly Poly Rag Bear but according to what I could scrape off the Net was that Mihoko Tanoue（田之上美穂子）and Makoto Igarashi（五十嵐誠）formed the pair in 1998 and released a number of singles and albums including "Straw, Water, Pinstripe" throughout the 2000s before going on hiatus in late 2010. Along with their sunny and warm indie pop stylings, they were also known for performing some Shibuya-kei although I have yet to come across any of that part of their discography.