Editor’s note: This interview was conducted and published in print before Erasure’s concerts in both Orlando and St. Petersburg were postponed. New dates will be announced at a later time.
Formed in London in 1985, the synthpop duo Erasure have written over 200 songs and sold over 28 million albums worldwide. Consisting of openly gay singer-songwriter Andy Bell and songwriter, producer and keyboardist Vince Clarke (co-founder of the band Depeche Mode), the band is set to begin their latest North American tour in Florida this month.
Unlike many of his peers in the ‘80s, Bell has been openly gay since the beginning of his career, cementing Erasure and Bell as icons in the LGBTQ community. Watermark had the privilege of speaking with the living legend himself to discuss Erasure’s latest album and EP, the struggles of younger LGBTQ community members and some of the band’s most memorable performances.
WATERMARK: We’ve been dancing around for the last couple of weeks listening to both “The Neon,” as well as your new EP. They’ve both got that perfect vibe for living room dance parties as well as clubs. How would you personally describe the sound of these albums?
ANDY BELL: The idea behind when we started recording [“The Neon”] was to just try and kind of capture some of that initial enthusiasm that you have when you’re a teenager, when you first start playing records. It was that kind of excitement that we wanted to tap into, as well as some of the bands who were inspiring to us when I was a teenager, like Eurythnics and Japan, those kind of bands just, like, really inspired us for the songs on “The Neon.”
What went into making your most recent EP “Ne:EP”?
Well, to be honest, that was four tracks that we had, like spare after “The Neon,” because we had, I think, probably about 16 tracks on “The Neon,” and they kind of didn’t fit on the album. So we just saved them for an EP. Really, afterwards, kind of like some extra promotion [laughs].
You’re starting your North American tour in Florida, which is an honor. What can fans expect from this upcoming tour?
Well, we had great, really good reviews in the U.K. and we weren’t trying really hard. [Laughs] I don’t know. It seems like it’s a celebration really of our music and we’re kind of not really a very hyped band, so I think it’s people coming of their own accord or they hear about it from friends. This time we’ve had more requests from people to come view the shows and stuff than in a long, long time, so I was thinking, with everything that’s going on around the world, it’s made people think what they really want.
In looking at your discography, it’s clear to me that you’ve got these cycles. You have these big hits, you ride that wave for a while, and eventually things die down and you reinvent yourselves. You clearly know how to play the game, as it were. I’d be curious to hear your perspective on the current state of the music industry, especially in terms of emerging LGBTQ artists, and if you’ve got any advice for them.
It’s always very exciting for me when I see other LGBTQ artists coming through. My hat goes off to them, and I wish them the very best luck they could have. You always come into [the music industry] with your eyes wide open and you don’t really realize how tough it is.
For me, the thing that protected me in the beginning was my naivety, I suppose, and you just keep going. You go along and try not to let anything stop you but there are always going to be obstacles along the way. And sometimes you just feel like, oh shit. This isn’t worth it. It’s just taking too much of my energy or my time or whatever. But I think once you’ve made any kind of statement or if you’re involved in politics, you have to follow it through. You kind of just do it at your own pace.
Just keep your close knit group of friends around you and take advice from them and people that you feel you can trust in the industry because there aren’t that many people that you can confide in. It all comes down to you in the end. So you have to find your own space.
You are a bit of a pioneer – being an openly gay artist during a time where most countries still had sodomy laws. The struggles of the LGBTQ community were vastly different from the ones we are facing today. As an elder who has lived through so much, what do think the current struggles for the upcoming generation of LGBTQ people are?
For me, it seems like everything is so fast, especially living online. I’ve never met anybody online, so I wouldn’t know what that experience is like but it kind of seems to me, I mean, it’s quite scary, even though going to a pub is quite scary. [You’re meeting] a perfect stranger for the first time in the flesh, which is how we used to do it.
People just seem to be kind of judged quite aggressively now too or even more just on their appearance and how they look and stuff like that. It wasn’t as harsh then. I think when we were younger because you met people that were there who were present, we learned how to grow up in tribes, I suppose. And part of those groups did include elder people, which were always there to give us advice. I’m not sure whether young people have that anymore, depending on their circumstances.
I watched with my partner a program on HBO where they’re going around with small towns and meeting up with some LGBTQ people and having deep conversations with them about their struggle. I think that’s really something that’s really helped and something that is needed more. So I don’t know whether there’s any kind of outreach groups or things that we could organize, maybe online or something, but I don’t know if young people are willing to listen to older people anymore. I’m not sure.
You’ve overcome a lot. Hip replacements, knee replacements, addiction and you’re living with HIV. You are a very resilient person. What have these challenges taught you?
I just feel like everything is for a reason. I’m guessing certain things happened to me when I was younger so I could deal with them not so much in my old age. That’s why I really admire people like Frieda Carlo. She went through loads of struggles and kind of used her pain as a source for her creativity. And I think that’s kind of what happens when you’re a performer. You can’t help it. You overcome whatever it is you’re going through by performance and by relating to other people and by hopefully dissipating some of that pain and providing a source of joyfulness for an audience as well. To me that’s the most important thing. The contact with the audience and just wanting to have all of us share.
That is a perfect segue into our next question. You’ve been performing for years and I can’t even begin to imagine what some of your performances have been like from your perspective. If you could go back and play one gig over again, as though it was for the first time, when or where would you play?
I don’t know, really. I mean, we’ve been around quite a few consequential things as they have happened — a lot saying we made it happen. We were in Berlin when the wall came down, and then Czechoslovakia when they had their revolution there. And we’ve had people coming into the gigs where we practically just let the doors open. There’s been some quite memorable times. I couldn’t think of a real one-off that I would like to repeat, but there are a number of occasions. We’ve had some great things happen to us.
Those are all amazing! Is there anything left on your creative bucket list?
To be honest, I’m with my partner, and we just want to settle down. Because we’re moving around so much, you know, you look forward to this life, and it’s kind of like you don’t always want it to be in the future, but circumstances don’t allow for that. So we just really count our blessings and just look forward to that time.
Is there anything else you’d like to add?
We’ve always had an amazing time in Tampa, St. Petersburg — that’s where we met, my partner and I — so we’re really looking forward to the shows in Florida this time around.
Erasure, with special guest Bag Raiders, play at the Dr. Phillips Center in Orlando Jan. 15, with tickets available at DrPhillipsCenter.org, and The Mahaffey Theater Jan. 16, with tickets available at TheMahaffey.com.
