# Bury a Friend
**"Bury a Friend"** (stylized "bury a friend") is a 2019 song by the American singer-songwriter [Billie Eilish](https://www.edgepedia.org/billie-eilish), released on January 30, 2019 as the first single from her debut album *WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO?*, which followed on March 29 via Darkroom/[Interscope Records](https://www.edgepedia.org/interscope-records)[1](https://www.universalmusic.com.br/2019/01/30/ja-esta-disponivel-a-nova-musica-e-video-de-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/). Written and produced with her brother [Finneas O'Connell](https://www.edgepedia.org/finneas-oconnell), the track runs 3:13 and is built on a minimal, horror-inflected arrangement of distorted bass, whispered vocals, and found sounds[1](https://www.universalmusic.com.br/2019/01/30/ja-esta-disponivel-a-nova-musica-e-video-de-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/) • [2](https://songtell.com/billie-eilish/bury-a-friend). Eilish has described it as written from the perspective of the monster under her bed, and as a statement of what the whole album would become[1](https://www.universalmusic.com.br/2019/01/30/ja-esta-disponivel-a-nova-musica-e-video-de-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/).
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Release | January 30, 2019, as the first single from *WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO?* (album out March 29, 2019, Darkroom/Interscope)[1](https://www.universalmusic.com.br/2019/01/30/ja-esta-disponivel-a-nova-musica-e-video-de-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/) |
| Length and genre | 3:13; categorized as alternative[2](https://songtell.com/billie-eilish/bury-a-friend) |
| Creators | Billie Eilish with her brother Finneas O'Connell, who writes, produces, and records with her[1](https://www.universalmusic.com.br/2019/01/30/ja-esta-disponivel-a-nova-musica-e-video-de-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/) |
| Stated subject | The perspective of the monster under the bed; Eilish adds, "I confess that I am that monster, because I am my own worst enemy"[1](https://www.universalmusic.com.br/2019/01/30/ja-esta-disponivel-a-nova-musica-e-video-de-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/) |
| Inspiration | Eilish's experience of night terrors[3](https://www.hotpress.com/music/electric-picnic-news-full-billie-eilish-cover-story-22786373) |
| Music video | Directed by Michael Chaves, released alongside the single[1](https://www.universalmusic.com.br/2019/01/30/ja-esta-disponivel-a-nova-musica-e-video-de-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/) • [4](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9708390/) |
| Signature sounds | Breaking glass over the line "Step on the glass, staple your tongue"; a sampled scream and sine-wave synthesizer textures[5](https://mspace.lib.umanitoba.ca/server/api/core/bitstreams/d037b9fd-b2e4-4f52-a9ed-8225e859f8b7/content) • [6](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03007766.2026.2623721) |
## Origin and recording
The song came out of the same working method as the rest of the debut album: Eilish and Finneas O'Connell, her producer and co-writer, wrote and recorded *WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO?* entirely in their childhood home in [Highland Park, Los Angeles](https://www.edgepedia.org/highland-park-los-angeles), with most of 2018 spent writing on tour and long stretches recording in Finneas's bedroom studio[1](https://www.universalmusic.com.br/2019/01/30/ja-esta-disponivel-a-nova-musica-e-video-de-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/). Eilish said that when the pair made "bury a friend," "the whole album made sense in my head": she knew immediately what it would be about, what it would look like, and how she wanted it realized[1](https://www.universalmusic.com.br/2019/01/30/ja-esta-disponivel-a-nova-musica-e-video-de-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/).
In an interview with *Hot Press*, Eilish identified the single as inspired by her experience of night terrors[3](https://www.hotpress.com/music/electric-picnic-news-full-billie-eilish-cover-story-22786373). The album's title, which the song's lyrics incorporate, frames the record as a journey through sleep and nightmare[1](https://www.universalmusic.com.br/2019/01/30/ja-esta-disponivel-a-nova-musica-e-video-de-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/) • [7](https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/05/23/eili-m23.pdf).
## Sound and lyrics
The track is built from a small number of elements. Critics describe a subterranean industrial rumble, a goth-jazz swing, and Eilish's predatory, close-miked murmur, which slips at one point into a [Billie Holiday](https://www.edgepedia.org/billie-holiday)-style blues purr[8](https://au.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/-36726/bury-a-friend-36739/). Pitchfork's review of the album notes that despite vocoder-style distortion, her voice feels more intimate as she hisses "Step on the glass, staple your tongue" in a farcical singsong[9](https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/billie-eilish-when-we-all-fall-asleep-where-do-we-go/).
The production uses nontraditional samples. The sound of breaking glass plays over the lyric "Step on the glass, staple your tongue," part of a broader practice on the album of sourcing found sounds, from sharpening knives in "you should see me in a crown" to dialogue from *The Office* in "my strange addiction"[5](https://mspace.lib.umanitoba.ca/server/api/core/bitstreams/d037b9fd-b2e4-4f52-a9ed-8225e859f8b7/content). A scholar of bedroom-pop aesthetics describes the track's audiovisual vocabulary as drawn from nightmares: a sampled scream and "sine-wavey synthesizer ululations" accentuate the fear in Eilish's sung line "why aren't you scared of me"[6](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03007766.2026.2623721).
The lyrics dwell on self-directed menace. *Time* highlighted the repeated line "I want to end me" over screeching beats as an example of the eerie edge running through Eilish's music[10](https://time.com/5736159/best-albums-2019/). Commentators have read the song as giving voice to intrusive thoughts, emotional numbness, and self-destructive ideation, with Eilish directing the horror toward herself rather than away[2](https://songtell.com/billie-eilish/bury-a-friend) • [11](https://falconsnestcomeheal.wordpress.com/2025/04/23/lyric-analysis-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/).
## Music video
The official video, directed by Michael Chaves, was uploaded at the same time as the single[1](https://www.universalmusic.com.br/2019/01/30/ja-esta-disponivel-a-nova-musica-e-video-de-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/) • [4](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9708390/). It invokes horror tropes directly: Eilish plays a spectral figure lurking under a bed, seen with lifeless eyes by a young man who jolts awake from a nightmare in a nocturnal urban soundscape and falls back asleep[6](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03007766.2026.2623721).
## Reception and afterlife
Critics received the song as a defining statement of the debut album's dark theatrical pop. *The Guardian* called the album a hugely assured debut that flits between gothic, cartoonish show tunes and sculptural electronic strangeness[12](https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/mar/31/billie-eilish-when-we-all-fall-asleep-where-do-we-go-review), and *Time* placed the album sixth on its list of the ten best albums of 2019, citing "Bury a Friend" among its eeriest moments[10](https://time.com/5736159/best-albums-2019/). Rolling Stone later ranked the song number 9 on its list of the 20 best Billie Eilish songs, describing how it walks "the finest of fine lines between terror and intimacy"[8](https://au.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/-36726/bury-a-friend-36739/).
The song has remained a fixture of Eilish's live repertoire. A 2025 *Guardian* concert review noted the "menacing mosquito synths" of the early single, amplified with literal pyrotechnics on stage[13](https://www.theguardian.com/music/2025/feb/19/billie-eilish-review-snarls-seduction-and-moments-of-sheer-rapture), and the 2025 concert film *Billie Eilish - Hit Me Hard and Soft: The Tour (Live in 3D)* features a "Bury a Friend" performance whose production, the *Associated Press* wrote, pulls inspiration from hip-hop[14](https://apnews.com/article/1254c753050814438974f97b7c935e77). Later work has echoed it deliberately: on *Hit Me Hard and Soft* (2024), Eilish opens a track with "Don't be afraid of me," a command that revises the 2019 song's question "Why aren't you scared of me?"[15](https://apnews.com/article/cf56aba05b52018159319114ba0ab659).
## References
1. [Já está disponível a nova música e vídeo de Billie Eilish, "Bury A Friend", Universal Music Brasil (January 30, 2019)](https://www.universalmusic.com.br/2019/01/30/ja-esta-disponivel-a-nova-musica-e-video-de-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/)
2. ["bury a friend" by Billie Eilish - Meaning & Analysis, Songtell](https://songtell.com/billie-eilish/bury-a-friend)
3. [The Full Billie Eilish Cover Story, Hot Press](https://www.hotpress.com/music/electric-picnic-news-full-billie-eilish-cover-story-22786373)
4. [Billie Eilish: Bury a Friend (Music Video 2019), IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9708390/)
5. [Aesthetic Amalgams and Political Pursuits: Intertextuality in Music (thesis chapter, University of Manitoba)](https://mspace.lib.umanitoba.ca/server/api/core/bitstreams/d037b9fd-b2e4-4f52-a9ed-8225e859f8b7/content)
6. [Making and Visualizing Music in the Bedroom and Living House, Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic, with Billie Eilish and Fiona Apple, Popular Music and Society](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03007766.2026.2623721)
7. [Social problems begin to come to the fore in Billie Eilish's debut album, World Socialist Web Site](https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/05/23/eili-m23.pdf)
8. [The 20 Best Billie Eilish Songs, Rolling Stone Australia (February 1, 2022)](https://au.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/-36726/bury-a-friend-36739/)
9. [Billie Eilish: When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? Album Review, Pitchfork](https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/billie-eilish-when-we-all-fall-asleep-where-do-we-go/)
10. [The 10 Best Albums of 2019, Time](https://time.com/5736159/best-albums-2019/)
11. [Lyric Analysis - Billie Eilish's bury a friend, Falcon's Nest](https://falconsnestcomeheal.wordpress.com/2025/04/23/lyric-analysis-billie-eilish-bury-a-friend/)
12. [Billie Eilish: When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? review - a hugely assured debut, The Guardian (March 31, 2019)](https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/mar/31/billie-eilish-when-we-all-fall-asleep-where-do-we-go-review)
13. [Billie Eilish review - snarls, seduction and moments of sheer rapture, The Guardian (February 19, 2025)](https://www.theguardian.com/music/2025/feb/19/billie-eilish-review-snarls-seduction-and-moments-of-sheer-rapture)
14. [Movie Review: Billie Eilish and James Cameron make concert movie magic with 'Hit Me Hard and Soft', Associated Press](https://apnews.com/article/1254c753050814438974f97b7c935e77)
15. [Music Review: Billie Eilish's 'Hit Me Hard and Soft' is zealous outsider pop in a league of her own, Associated Press](https://apnews.com/article/cf56aba05b52018159319114ba0ab659)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Music › Musical works and recordings › Compositions and songs › Pop, rock, and metal songs › Pop songs › Pop songs of the 2020s*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license