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Spankin New Sessions: Jack Ladder

The sweaty air and throbbing music descended on you as soon as you walked through the heavy wooden doors of the tucked away Spanish club. Jack Ladder, aka Tim Rogers stood behind the turntables, programming the 50’s and 60’s inspired jive that was blasting out of the speakers]]>

Spankin New Sessions: Belles Will Ring

“We like to throw down the gauntlet and do something strange,” Belles will ring Singer Liam Judson told MTV. How strange exactly? Like turning your number two album into number one and a half? Or steering away from your signature sound in favour of scarier tone? When the Belles dropped by for a sneaky Spankin’ New Session, we learnt exactly how far their gauntlet was thrown.
Fist track Lantern Of Black Light is doused in 60’s throwbacks, with the Byrds influencing the catchy chorus and two part harmonies. The song is the grungiest tune in the Belles catalogue, combining garage aspects with the group’s psychedelic folk sound.
“[Lantern Of Black Light] is from a compilation called Burn Your Fingers On The Sun. We decided to record a song for it to make the album unique so anyone who gets a compilation gets something fresh. Now it’s become sort of a live favourite for us,” Judson said. “It’s usually so loud and such full on mayhem that we thought it would be interesting to hear it jangly and almost nice. It’s quite different,” he added.
Second song, I’m Walking Here, taken off new mini LP Broader Than Broadway, recalls House Of The Rising Sun guitar and shows off the band’s vocal harmonies.
The dreamscape track Songs on the Avenue closed the Belles Will Ring Spankin’ New Session. The scaled down, standing drumming of Ivan Lisyak and rhythm section brought by Kent Williams, sent you packing in the DeLorean straight back to the late sixties and early seventies.
“We have been classified as folk rock before, so I guess this is the closest to the folk rock sound we can bring. No effects, no nothing. Just jangly guitars,” guitarist Aiden Roberts said.
Releasing their latest sounds in the form of mini album Broader Than Broadway in November last year, the Sydney boys decided to step a little to the left of their characteristic psychedelic folk sound.
“I was a bit concerned. Its still very much a Belles release, but it does add some pretty interesting different directions on there and I wasn’t really sure how it would be taken, but its all been pretty damn positive,” Judson enthused.
Brought up on a regular diet of the Byrds, Nick Drake, Simon and Garfunkel and the Manchester sounds of the Stone roses, the Belles explored their musical palate on debut album Mood Patterns. This time around, they decided to keep a little under their hat.
“With Broader Than Broadway I think it’s probably harder to hear our references because its kind of a bitsy record. The sound and vibe is pretty separate from what we were doing previous. We tried for something else,” Roberts suggested.
Entering the studio with the aim of recording their sophomore LP, Belles Will Ring hit a bump in the road when they realised their new material lacked the cohesion they wanted in a full length offering.
“The songs that we were recording were just songs that started popping up after mood patterns came out. But because they were coming from different places there was no kind of through thread or common idea,” Judson explained. “We decided we preferred the idea of writing for a purpose, writing for a particular release so that all the songs have a similar feel and vibe in mind,” he added.
Instead, the recordings went towards album 1.5, Broader than Broadway, a seven track album representing the musical change in the band since the release of their debut in 2007.
The album sees the four gentlemen stepping away from their psychedelic roots slightly as they express their wanting to move forward as a band without loosing their original influences and sounds.
“We want to branch out so that we’re not just classified as a psychedelic band. I don’t think we would turn our back on the whole psychedelic sound so much, but certainly we would like to be seen as doing different things which are certainly outside that genre. So we’re not doing a complete left turn,” Judson insisted.
As for the future, the REAL album number two is cooking away in the Belles universe. But if you think Broadway pushed the band’s sound, wait till you hear what they have in store.
“It’s going to be darker and filled with songs with some pretty aggressive stuff in there. But you know we always kind of balance that with the opposite end of the spectrum in a lot of cases,” Roberts said. “I think the next record will be just a bit scarier than anything we’ve done so far.”
Author: Keely Kovacevic]]>

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