The rock band Base Ball Bear will be releasing “changes” on May 8th. The title song is being used as the ending for the anime Toshokan Senso.

Base Ball Bear is a band that I feel has a generally pleasant sound. All of their songs are good, but few of them really are stand-outs, the kind of song that gets looped endlessly when it comes out. Still, I really like them because I like their sound in general – it’s driving while laid-back, rocking while not being overpowered by rock instrumentals, Koide Yusuke’s vocals highlighted by Sekine Shiori’s in parts, the feeling of the song sometimes bittersweet and always wistful.

I don’t know how to describe in words exactly how “changes” sounds different from other Base Ball Bear songs – it’s exactly a song as you would expect from the band. Which means it’s laid-back wistfully reminiscent rock, and a pretty good song. Bands that always sound the same are often very criticized, but while Base Ball Bear sounds the same their songs still sound fresh – in this case, it’s probably best to let the music speak for itself.

As a side note though, every single album’s singles has a theme in the cover decoration – “C” singles had the triangle tree, “17 Sai” singles had the blog cartoon thing. So will the next theme be the little symbol at the top and/or the barely legible scribble script? I really can’t tell, but it does look prettier than the triangle tree and cartoon, even if it’s hard to read. I really like these little touches – gimmicky maybe, but charming definitely.