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New music from Tom Goss: Bear Soup

A celebration of summer pool parties and marmalade.

Gaydar

28 May 2025 — 9 min read

Tom Goss has released new music - the track is Bear Soup.

For our podcast, How To Date Men, we caught up with Tom for a behind-the-scenes look at the track and his passion for bears.

Listen to the episode

What's the process you follow to create music that really aims to capture the spirit of summer?

You know, for this one in particular, I just was, I don't even know why I thought this, but I was thinking, why isn't there a twerk anthem for bears? Because it would be really funny, you know, because bears have like more to twerk, like we should be twerking, like the bear community should be twerking, not only twerking their asses, but twerking their bellies. And I was like, why is there not a bear anthem for bears? And why do we not have this dance where bears twerk their belly instead of their asses? Because that would be like fun and just like, you know, don't know, sexy and yeah, I think it would be really fun. So I was like, why doesn't this exist? And then I'm like, because I'm meant to make it. That's why it hasn't been made yet.

So then I just was like, okay, well, what is this going to be? What is this going to sound like? I was actually in Barcelona when I had this idea, I might have been on the plane. And then I was just walking around Barcelona, looking at looking at cute guys in the street, and just like thinking about what the chorus would be.

You know, I was just like, what are funny words to put in this chorus? Obviously, like, bear soup, hair soup. And then I was like, consommé, that's funny. And there was a word before marmalade, which I love the word marmalade. Like, it's just such a good word.

I was slightly confused by the Marmalade reference - how did we get to Marmalade?

I'll tell you how we got to marmalade. I was thinking of like, aid, right? So then it was like a lemonade, right? Which is very summery. And I was like, lemonade's funny. But then I was thinking like, but it's not quite right. And then I can't even remember what this word is. But "je flou" in French means something. And I don't know what it is. But I should re-look it up before I do more interviews but it probably will never come up again, but there's this word, "je flou", and it means something. And I can't remember what. Sometimes I just like want to put in a specific word or a specific feeling and the English word is just wrong. And so I'm like, shit. And then I looked at the Spanish word and I was like, no. And I was like, oh, it'd be really funny if it was French.

And then it was "je flou". And then it was "je flou-ade". And I was like, that's funny. But sometimes I make things too complicated. Because to me, it's funny. And I understand the joke around it. Like "je flou-ade", it's hilarious. But nobody's going to know that. And nobody's going to go through the work to like, look that up. So then one day, I just sang Marmalade instead of "je flou-ade". And obviously it flows better. You know what I mean? And it just made me laugh. And when you think about something like Marmalade, like it's sweet. It's fun. It's bright. It's jiggly. It's like nutritious. in the way that like bears are nutritious. It's like for me it like hit all the marks and I was like, that's hilarious. And then of course, when I was talking to Michael Serrato who directed the video about it, he was like, we need to have a Marmalade Wrestling.

That was my other question - when did we start marmalade wrestling?

We never did. We do it only in my video. And that's all that really matters. But that's my job. Like, my job is to take things that we think of as like old and like crusty and, you know, no offence, British, and invert it. Marmalade for British people is like your granny. And marmalade through an American lens is hot bears wrestling and then making out. I mean, I do think I elevated what Marmalade is and what Marmalade could be.

You touched on filming the video and the bears wrestling and marmalade. What was that filming process like? How difficult is it to coordinate a pack of bears in that way to get them to focus on the job at hand?

It's pretty difficult. Well, it's easy in some ways because every time I make a bear content kind of thing, people are so excited to be a part of it. And sometimes it's like hard to find the right people. But for something like this, I think I posted online about it and then I was just flooded. So the hard part is like communicating with 100 people at the same time.

I think at the time it was like Thanksgiving-ish and I was driving around the Midwest, like I was driving around Oklahoma and Kansas, just calling people, hey, it's Tom. And just like pulling people in, like, this is what we're doing. This is when it's going to happen. And then like endless amounts of spreadsheets - who's where and who's coming or what are phone numbers or what are emails and ultimately like a bunch of people are gonna flake so you have to like overbook things and I've made so many things. I'm a really good producer. So it kind of is, it's not super stressful for me, but it is a stressful process. And at this point in time in my career, I kind of just moved with the flow of it.

This so often happens when you're arranging a shoot. You prepare for the worst. And then when you show up, it's more beautiful and more perfect than you could have ever imagined. And that's essentially what happened. Everybody was early. Everybody was on time. People drove here. People hopped on planes. People flew in from all over the country. It's just like people want to be a part of something that celebrates them.

Talk about your relationship with the bear community because, at face value, you wouldn't automatically assume that you're one of the bears, but your commitment and connection to the bear community is deep and long and strong. Just explain to people how you got to that point?

I think the idea that like looking at you, you wouldn't think that you're part of the bear community. Like that in itself holds so much of like what society is telling us we're supposed to think and we're supposed to believe and we're supposed to be attracted to. And it's just kind of strange to me as somebody who's attracted to men of size, who's attracted to bears, who's attracted to cubs, who's attracted to chubs, who's attracted to a wide range of sizes and shapes and colours and ages. frankly, I'm super grateful for that because if I was stuck in seeing the world, seeing beauty the way the world has told me to see beauty, I feel like I would be less good of a person, less empathetic of a person, less good of an artist. Like I would think in the box a lot more. I think the fact of the matter is that people are attracted to a wide range of people. We have put some sort of societal stigma on going outside of the box and being open about, I'm actually attracted to this as well, you know, as whatever you say is beautiful.

My job as a creator who sees beauty differently, who is sexually attracted to a different kind of person, is to create that same kind of image and to stop shooting men of size in a context that makes them the joke, that makes them the buffoon, that makes them the sloppy person, the messy person, the unattractive person.

I didn't understand that I was attracted to men or that I was attracted to bears for so long in my life because I was never presented with an image with the context of this can be beautiful to you until I was, you know, 23, 24. I didn't even understand that I could look at that person and have a sexual desire there that was acceptable, you know, not even that it was acceptable that it was possible.

Until you can unlearn some of that stuff, you're just trapped in patterns of behaviour that make you really unhappy and feeling unworthy, unsuccessful because you either don't look like the beauty ideal or you can't have sex with those men because they don't want to have sex with you?

Exactly. None of it's necessary. None of this serves anybody. So we might as well just say like, hey, there's a variety of different shapes, colours, genders that one can be attracted to. When one presents itself to you and you have an urge to be attracted to that, that's a beautiful thing. End of story.

Talk a little bit about bear parties and events because you're often performing at bear events. They have a bit of a reputation for being the best events - the best vibe, the best crowds. Is that justified?

If I'm being honest, I've never been to like a twink event. So I can't compare, you know what I mean? I mean, of course I've been to plenty of bars, I've been to WeHo and the truth of the matter is that I get along with everybody. I find, this is my experience in the world and it's not everybody, but I find human beings to be pretty friendly if you're friendly to them.

The thing about Bear Events for me, it's not really a fair fight because there are a bunch of people there that I know and there are a bunch of people that love me and there's a bunch of people that I love. And so when I show up, I'm just excited to be amongst my family. I think if I went to like the white party in Palm Springs and everybody was 21 and completely shredded, I might not feel that, but that might be more because I don't know anybody who's there. And I'm just feeling like old and fat. And it's the same stuff. And that same beauty standard will then be dropped upon my head. And I would feel shame about that.

What are your plans for the summer?

I'm about to fly back to the East Coast and then I'm on a really like a six week long tour. So I'm going to be in Philly, Baltimore, DC, Reston, Virginia, Lost River, West Virginia, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Nashville, Huntsville, Alabama, Atlanta, Georgia, Charleston, South Carolina, New York City, Easton Mountain. And then I'm in P-Town Bear Week for a week. So come, come to the shows. I'd love to see you.

What do hope that people feel when they're listening to Bear Soup?

I hope they feel joy. And that's like a really simple answer for me. If you asked me about anything, I would say that. But specifically for Bear Soup, I hope they feel embraced. And I hope they feel that they can embrace wherever they're at in their physical, sexual attractiveness journey and love who they are and love who they love. Without exception and without boundary and just live in that joy. That's what I hope that they do. I hope they shake their ass and I hope they have to shake their belly too, like 100%.