Take That, Damien Rice

Bell X1 return to conquer America: A talk with Paul Noonan

Bell X1
Photo by Richard Gilligan
Bell X1
Photo by Jan Von Holleben

Ireland's Bell X1 came about somewhat by accident. When noted folk-rocker Damien Rice left the Irish rock band Juniper in 1998 over creative differences, the remaining band members elected to carry on and move Paul Noonan from drums to vocals, Genesis-style. To call the result a success would be an understatement—the group are now second only to U2 in Ireland as both the top live draw and top radio play act in the nation.

As such, when U2 recently asked Bell X1 to support on a recent 80,000 seat stadium date, the Irish music press complained that Bell X1 were too popular for that sort of thing. After finding some American radio success in 2009 with single "The Great Defector," Bell X1 return to the USA this month in support of their newest effort Bloodless Coup (Yep Roc). The new album was recorded live in the studio, and trades some of the catchiness of its predecessors in for a more cohesive atmosphere and some electronic experimentation (albeit within reason—this record still has some great singles on it).

We recently spoke to Bell X1 frontman Paul Noonan about the group's new LP, the thrills of American touring and the Occupy protesters.

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To start out, when I talked to you for the last record (Blue Lights On The Runway), you said that an electronic element or influence was something that was on your mind going into the recording process but "How Your Heart is Wired" was the only track on that album that really turned out that way. And it seemed like on the new record there was actually a lot more of that electronic texture. Did you push harder for that sound, or was that the way it worked out?

Yeah, that was interesting—how that sort of element sort of shone this time around. I think for the most part it was because of who we made the record with. It was the first record we made as a five-piece. The five of us in the room, playing and not having to sort of patch things up after, or project beyond the three or four of us that were in the room. I think it was also the first record we made with Rory on drums and Marc playing some keys and guitar. The guys have been playing with us live for the last two or three years but had never really recorded. They would kind of steer things a little toward the electronic end of things, I think.

I felt like the record as a whole just felt a little more subtle and experimental than the last two. Was it conscious that you were kind of pulling away from that "playing to the rafters" thing?

That's interesting that you say that. Again, I think it's really just the process was so different. We really wanted to record quickly—and sort of more instinctively—as opposed to it being a kind of cerebral process that was unending, which is what it often feels like. And in ways we were partly inspired by a documentary about the Motown recordings—Standing in the Shadows of Motown. It was mainly about the house band that the Motown label had and how they kind of got screwed over. But the idea of being wonderfully intuitive musicians that could just go and do things quickly and instinctively... I suppose it was a regression to a time when you couldn't really lean on technology and use technology to cover up any shortcomings. You had to really be shit-hot players and go into the studio and capture things really quickly.

So we only spent a month recording, whereas we spent quite a few months rehearsing and we also recorded in a proper studio as opposed to using our own equipment and hiring a space or a house or somewhere. I don't know. It's very hard for us to be objective about it, but I do think there's a kind of "band in a room, playing at once" quality to it, as opposed to it being a sort of patchwork that's built up.

I have to ask this because I'm sitting in Austin, Texas right now, but your recent single "Velcro" mentions a rainy field in Texas, and I'm curious if that's a direct reference to the gig in the mud that you played at ACL a few years back.

Yes, it is! It is. It was quite a moment. It was the last place we expected that sort of crazy weather, man. We certainly hadn't prepared for it, and neither had anyone else it seems. We definitely had a moment there where we were trying to leave and the van was stuck. We were parked right behind the main stage and it just kept kind of sloshing around the field and at one point we kind of slammed into a lighting tower and we're like, "Jesus, we'd better leave this alone." So eventually, we got two tractors to pull us out and onto a kind of firm road, but yeah, we were all out there digging under the wheels and trying to fill the space with stones and it was pouring rain and we were all soaked and the sky was wracked with lightening—but Levon Helm was singing on stage beside us.

It was just a great sort of Stand By Me moment, and it kind of crystallized that romantic notion of all being in it together and for us, the romance of touring in the States was...is still there, you know? It's still very much there, and now we haven't been to Austin since. It's kind of rare that we get down there, so we're really looking forward to it.

That dovetails nicely to another question, which is that financially and logistically it would certainly be easier and more lucrative for you guys to gig more in Europe and Ireland (where the group typically play to several thousand fans a night). What kind of motivates you to log the time and, you know, get in the van and do an extensive US tour like this?

I think it touches on why you get into music and being in a band in the first place. It's partly to get out and see the world, and coming from a stony outcrop on the Western edge of Europe, you really have to get beyond that and see the world. You know, we're still pushing our boundaries. We get to Australia and the Far East for the first time early next year, and that's the kind of thing that really kind of turns us on and makes us want to keep doing it. In the States, when we did eventually get records released there, which was three records into our career—we really went for it, you know? We really embraced it and have been there ten or twelve times since—three or four times per album and when we do, we get to generally get somewhere we haven't been before every time. I mean, last time around it was Denver. Exploring is still very much a part of touring for us.

You mentioned technology earlier and not being able to rely on it, but in terms of getting your music out to people, everything's changed in recent years. Bell X1 are in really regular rotation on Sirius/XM radio here in the US. They seem to love the last couple of records. Do things like satellite radio and YouTube actually help you build a fan base in other countries more than perhaps would have been the case a few years ago.

Yeah, I think it's been indispensable in kind of clearing the forest and foliage ahead of us, you know? I remember distinctly, our first trip to the USA was on the back of having two songs used in The O.C. before we'd had anything released in the States. We did a couple of shows in New York and then in LA on the back of that, and they were small club shows, but they were stuffed full of people who seemed to know the words and it was incredible for us to kind of be welcomed in that way, and it was purely because people had been turned on to the band and it was mainly by The O.C. and then kind of going and digging out stuff online.

When we were talking about you doing all these American tours, I read that you guys have a serious fondness for American diners. Have you actually chosen the best diner in America yet?

Oh, man! It's difficult. We get turned on to stuff locally really, by talking to folks after gigs. That's what we've found is the best way of doing things, and there's a place in San Francisco called Dotty's True Blue Cafe. They have the most amazing omelets. I think it has to be Dotty's, you know. I'm sure there are some gems we have yet to discover, perhaps where you are.

When you're at The Parish, both The Counter Cafe and 24 Diner are right up the road. Those are both quite good.

Okay! Let's do it.

I read that you had a duets project that you're putting together as a record called Ones+Twos. How is that going, and is it a little bit like "The Cake Sale" project that you all were involved with a while back? (Note: "The Cake Sale" was an Oxfam all-star charity record helmed by Bell X1 member Brian Crosby.)

Yeah, I suppose it is, It's a lot less focused, and it's been sort of my potting shed for the last couple of years. When I get some time, I track down some folks and see if they'd like to record. I've always loved the sort of simplicity of two voices and two guitars in the same space and leaving it alone. So I've been traveling light with some recording equipment, four microphones and my guitar, and trying to find folks that will be up for a recording in such a way. It is coming along, and I can still think of a few songs to record, and hopefully I'll get a finished record out next year.

Excellent. So to finish, there's a real timeliness to your new song "Sugar High." (The song references Ireland's financial collapse and the bankers and financiers involved.) You didn't mince words on that about the cronyism and arrogance that have led to the global financial crisis. We just wondered about your thoughts about all the "Occupy" protests that have been happening in recent weeks that have been very much in line with what you're talking about in that song.

Yeah it keeps going and keeps going. I mean, the song was written about the Irish experience, but it's become [bigger]. There's a universality to it, and the tendency of man is generally to kind of get carried away and drag us all into the shit. And, here we are witnessing, you know, with the recent movements, it's made the leap from nutters who are kind of dismissed as jumping on any cause to a lightning rod globally for global anger, you know with people camping out here in Dublin, inspired by the "Occupy Wall Street" movement also, so... I do think it's inspiring, I think the people who are doing it are inspiring.

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Bell X1 will perform at The Parish on Wednesday, November 9th. Tickets are available through C3 Concerts here.

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Movie Review

Jennifer Lawrence plays off-kilter mom in bizarre thriller Die My Love

Photo by Kimberley French/courtesy of MUBI

Jennifer Lawrence in Die My Love.

Writer/director Lynne Ramsay does not make feel-good movies. Her previous two films —You Were Never Really Here and We Need to Talk About Kevin — were about a traumatized veteran who tracks down missing girls for a living and parents reckoning with a child who might be a sociopath, respectively. Her latest, Die My Love, has a story as dark as its title.

Grace (Jennifer Lawrence) and Jackson (Robert Pattinson) are a married couple who move into a run-down house that used to belong to Jackson’s uncle, who shot and killed himself on the property. That doesn’t exactly scream “great vibes,” but the somewhat manic duo quickly introduce a child into the equation, an event that forms a schism between two people who previously seemed to be on the same off-kilter wavelength.

While Jackson works to provide for the family, Grace is left to take care of the baby and herself at the somewhat remote house. She doesn’t appear to be a big fan of the arrangement, engaging in all manner of odd behavior, like crawling around the floor, talking to herself, and taking the baby on miles-long walks to visit her mother-in-law, Pam (Sissy Spacek), who’s not doing well herself after recently losing her husband, Harry (Nick Nolte).

Ramsay, who co-wrote the film with Enda Walsh and Alice Birch, foregrounds Grace’s experience above all others, but the film is far from straightforward. The idea of post-partum depression is raised as a reason for Grace’s weird behavior, but as both she and Jackson are introduced as two people who skew to the “ab” side of normal, it’s difficult to say that everything she does is due to feelings that arise after giving birth.

Plus, Grace has plenty to be upset about in general, including living in a death house, being left alone with their child the majority of the time, and Jackson bringing home a yapping dog without even so much as a conversation. But the manifestation of her anger/depression is hard to parse, as Ramsay includes scenes of her carrying around a butcher knife, meeting up with a mysterious figure on a motorcycle, and other strange things that may or may not actually be happening.

There is clearly a lot of metaphorical work being done by seemingly random things like the reappearance of a black horse on multiple occasions, blaring rock music that accompanies several scenes, and the use of the 1x1 aspect ratio by Ramsay. It’s easy to feel the intensity of the film’s central relationship and their conflicts even if you can’t make heads or tails of the allusions that the filmmaker seems to love.

Lawrence is put through the wringer almost as much as she was in Darren Aronofsky’s Mother!, and her performance is one that can be felt strongly. Still, because the narrative is unclear, she often appears to be overwrought in certain scenes. Pattinson never fits well with his uncaring and/or oblivious character. Spacek makes a nice impression in a limited amount of screen time, but why Ramsay chose to use the ultra-talented LaKeith Stanfield in the nothing part of the motorcycle rider is baffling.

Those who love to dig into symbolism and non-linear storytelling will have a field day with the arty Die My Love. But for everyone else, anything Ramsay might have been trying to say about the difficulties of being a mother gets buried under many scenes that don’t make any logical sense and over-the-top acting that’s only fit to match the bizarreness of the film itself.

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Die My Love is now playing in theaters.

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