Andy Bell – Ten Crowns interview

With Erasure firmly back at the business end of the charts, Andy Bell talks to Classic Pop about his solo album Ten Crowns. 

“Oh, it’s lovely,” beams Andy Bell, assessing the return of Erasure to the Top 10. “It’s not like the olden days, when we’d go on TV shows hosted by Mel Sykes and Des O’Connor. We don’t have that showbiz presence, but we still have the musical presence: we’ve got success without needing the celebrity.”

Over a lunchtime coffee at a hotel by the Tower of London, close on the Tube from Andy’s home in East London, Andy Bell seems very happy with his lot. So he should be. World Be Gone and The Neon gave Erasure their first consecutive Top 10 albums in nearly 30 years, without Bell and Vince Clarke needing to get involved in red carpets and chatshows.

Quietly spoken, but full of hugs and an easygoing self-deprecating charm, Bell is relaxed as he tells CP about how he’s finding success more fun second time round. In clear-framed glasses and a white T-shirt showing tattooed arms, the singer who put the front into frontman once Erasure appeared with Wonderland 40 years ago admits: “I’m as bad as the next person for doomscrolling. I look at all the celeb gossip and think: ‘How can you do that?’ I’m so glad I’m not part of it. If social media had been around back in the day, I’m sure I’d have been caught up in all the dramas.”

Smelling Of Roses

Unlike other musician interviews, where a manager lurking is death for building a rapport, it helps that Bell’s manager, Stephen Moss, is sat next to the singer at our corner table: the outgoing Moss is also Bell’s husband of 12 years and only interrupts our hour once. On Bell’s fabulous new solo album Ten Crowns, opulent closer Thank You features the line: “My mum always told me if I fell in shit, I’d always come out smelling of roses.”

Asked if the lyric is true, Bell considers: “I do, pretty much. I do stink now, though, as Steve will tell you.” To which Moss responds archly: “No, he smells like a rose.” Laughter all round. Andy Bell’s personal life seems as sorted as the professional.

Pop Whirlwind

Ten Crowns is Bell’s third pop solo album and his first since Non-Stop in 2010. Despite the lengthy gap while Erasure regained their grip on the charts, it’s an ultrapop whirlwind which has been gestating for 12 years, since Bell began writing songs with Dave Audé. An established writer/DJ who’s worked with Beyoncé, Lady Gaga and Rihanna, L.A.-raised Audé and Bell initially teamed up because “I just wanted to see what it’s like writing with other people, or maybe to write for other people.”

The first song they wrote was Don’t Cha Know, a blissed-out groove recalling Faithless, and not a bad start. It helps that Audé is a major Erasure fan. “Dave’s favourite album is Wild! and his favourite song is Blue Savannah,” grins Bell. “When we’re in the studio, Dave will look round and see me writing lyrics. Sometimes he does a double-take that it’s me he’s seeing. That’s so lovely, as it helps me feel like I belong.”

Battle Armour

That Bell needs reassurance he belongs in the industry, despite 40 years at the top, is indicative of his self-doubt. The flamboyance of his Erasure outfits is part of the armour he’s needed to help overcome being a shy kid from Peterborough. He’s been bloody good at his job for a long time now, of course, but his confidence is never going to be bulletproof.

“Singing is about baring your soul,” says Bell of his reasons for becoming a vocalist. “Doing that is really hard, and you never fully achieve it. But you try.” The bravado is so convincing, it even fools his Erasure bandmate. “Vince always tells me: ‘You’re fearless,’” smiles Andy. “I tell him: ‘I’m not as fearless as you think I am.’ But you have to look fearless if you’re the frontman.”

Good Vibrations

Bell is drawn to fellow shy singers, noting: “You can tell if a singer is shy: it’s something about their soul. Singing is so precious that they hold it close. I love Elizabeth Fraser and Sinéad O’Connor. Sinéad held her soul so close, while at the same time she was so bare.”

For Bell himself, singing is completely natural. “My voice was my friend,” he says. “I always liked my voice. I was forever singing in bed. I’d have the blankets over me, singing away, my parents telling me: ‘Go to sleep!’ I wasn’t even singing along to the radio, I’d just lie there making up songs. I loved feeling the vibration in my skeleton that singing gave me. I didn’t really decide to be a singer, I just couldn’t not do this.”

The success of Erasure has been a by-product of that need to keep feeling those vibrations, as he reasons: “I live for the stage. That’s not because of the adulation, nice as it is. That adulation, it’s silly. Performing is just in my bones, I was born with it. The flamboyance of my Erasure costumes, that was a character that developed. Eventually, that character became less and less important, because you are who you are.”

Time For Inclusivity

Of course, Bell’s sexuality and representing the LGBTQ+ community is an important part of the desire to bare his soul. On Ten Crowns, the fiery Godspell is a brilliantly bracing riposte to the religious preachers who criticised the drag bands Bell and Audé enjoyed watching while recording the album at the producer’s home studio in Nashville.

“I don’t like the hypocrisy of exclusion,” Bell explains of Godspell’s genesis. “‘Amen’ means ‘Unto everybody.’ If you’re not going to include a particular person, you can’t say ‘amen’ anymore. I’m not a believer in religion at all.

“Godspell was inspired by Kate Bush’s Get Out Of My House: that idea of having your space invaded. It’s about how we have our circle and we’re not infringing on your rights, so why do you have to infringe on us and try telling us what to do? It’s basically saying, ‘Mind your own business.’”

Perfect Timing

While Erasure were at the forefront of the wave of LGBTQ+ artists in the 80s, Bell believes he was fortunate to enter the music industry when he did. “I was lucky to be born at the time of the civil rights movement in the 60s,” he reflects. “As a teenager in the 80s, I was lucky to have an open media, where sexuality could be discussed. Being in that gay wave in pop was like being a suffragette.

“We were part of a movement, and there was a feeling that something was happening. Before that, it was about being respected and having places to go. There was then a euphoria at being part of that wave. But, because of HIV, I was aware I had to do this, to be a part of that wave.”

Bell was diagnosed with HIV in 1998 and has remained a beacon of equality, another part of his bravado. But his smile is uncertain when asked where that bravado comes from. “I still feel like I’m a chicken,” he insists. “The bravado is from thinking: ‘What can they do to you?’ I have to put myself out there –what’s the worst that can happen?”

He’s pleased the music industry has at least superficially become more accepting, though the new album’s epic Put Your Empathy On Ice reflects what Bell believes has become a “Roman empire” aspect to society, of a binary “Thumbs up or thumbs down” approach, both in entertainment and debate in general.

The Times They Are A-Changin’

Of the changes in the music industry since Erasure began, Bell considers: “It’s a patriarchy, like everything else. It’s slowly changing, and it’s great there are now so many female artists, with lots of lesbian visibility. But it’s still a boys’ club. As we all eventually find out, you have to tread very carefully and keep your wits about you all the time.”

While roughly a quarter of Ten Crowns had already been written, the album took shape in earnest once Audé moved from Amsterdam to Nashville. Being deeply immersed in the hub of professional songwriting helped focus the pair’s minds.

“I think the spirit of a place enters the music,” Bell ponders. “There are so many writers in Nashville, plus because Dave is such an industry powerhouse, he knows everyone we could need to help on the album. Dave can get backing singers or musicians at any moment. Being solo, on an independent label, I don’t just put myself among these people. Being able to call on that talent, it makes me realise how far I’ve come. I finally feel like a prefect!”

While Bell is one of Audé’s heroes, one of the people the singer was able to call on for Ten Crowns is his own idol, Debbie Harry, an unmistakable presence on the riotous Heart’s A Liar.

The romp was co-written with Luciana Caporaso, the former Crush singer who now regularly works with Audé. It began as a more hi-NRG anthem, before Bell adapted the song with Blondie in mind. “I wanted that Iggy Pop and Debbie Harry style,” says Bell, referring to the pair’s vamping duet Well, Did You Evah! from 1990’s Aids charity album Red Hot + Blue.

Platinum Blondie

Bell first met Harry when Erasure recorded Too Darn Hot, for the same compilation of Cole Porter covers. Erasure were told “Someone is here to see you” at the “tiny” studio where most artists recorded their contributions. They all went out for drinks and have often met since, but Bell says: “We’ve always met halfway, at each other’s shows and so on. I last saw them when Blondie played Shepherd’s Bush Empire on their last tour. Backstage, Chris Stein was: ‘Andy! Hi!,’ which still makes me think: ‘What?!,’ because they’ve been on the scene so long that they know everyone.”

Despite that friendship for 35 years, it took a year before Harry eventually agreed to guest on Heart’s A Liar, as Andy insists: “I don’t have Debbie’s number and I’d never bother her if I did. It was a year of emails backwards and forwards about the song, and you don’t know how much Debbie really sees, how much is filtered before anything gets to her. I did a show in New York and received Debbie’s vocals for Heart’s A Liar on the very same day. Can you imagine? It was like a signal from heaven that the album was going to be okay.”

How does it feel to see “Andy Bell (featuring Debbie Harry)” on his album credits? “Amazing!”, he laughs. “What a goddess. Debbie is the queen to me. That’s never going to go away.”

More To Come

Bell turned 60 last year, with Ten Crowns arriving 20 years since debut solo album Electric Blue was released around his 40th birthday. He looks surprised when the anniversary is brought up, stating: “I promise it’s not deliberate, it’s just how these things turn out for release dates.”

It’s naturally more deliberate that the album is released during Erasure downtime. Bell thinks there’s more to come from him and Audé, but emphasises it’s back to working with Vince Clarke next.

“The love and respect Vince and I have for each other always allows us our own space,” says Bell of finding the time to make Ten Crowns. “That space helps each other grow.” His smile grows broader. “More than anything, Vince is my mate. We’re friends, we’re not going to abandon each other. When I saw Vince recently in Brooklyn, we went to his local pub. We promptly got spotted and I was: ‘Oh no! Not at your local! Sorry, Vince.’”

Thank You

Although that was a social visit, Bell’s album and Clarke’s instrumental 2023 record Songs Of Silence means the pair have seen each other’s solo performances away from Erasure. “Everything Vince does is so clever and arty, I think: ‘How did you think of that?’” says Bell, adding: “Seeing me live must have been strange for Vince, but he really liked it. It’s the first time Vince has seen me as a performer – seeing me from the front, after so many years being behind me on stage. He was: ‘Wow!’, which was really nice!”

Erasure’s next album is at the “just starting to get the ball rolling” stage, though Bell acknowledges: “You could be onto something,” when Classic Pop suggests it could be a slower album as a contrast to the uptempo Ten Crowns.

Andy Bell’s approach to his career in general is summed up on his new album’s dramatic finale, Thank You, in which he expresses his gratitude that the boy who sang all the time under the covers is still doing so, only now in public.

“That song is very sincerely felt,” says Bell, who mentions a couple of times in our interview how fortunate he feels. “I have so much gratitude and it is a sincere thank you to everyone who allows me to do this.”

There’s one last laugh. “It’s not quite, ‘Thank you for the music.’ I wouldn’t go near saying that in a song. Someone else got there first.”

Ten Crowns, is out on vinyl (white, oxblood and picture disc), CD (standard and 2CD versions), gold cassette and digitally via Crown Recordings, order here

Featured image credit: Sean Black

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