English duo Andy Bell and Vince Clarke make beautiful music together as Erasure. Clarke started collaborating with the openly gay Bell in 1985. Their debut single was "Who Needs Love Like That," and their hits continued on with "Chains of Love," "A Little Respect" and "Always."
World Be Gone is the 17th studio album from the band and the current World Beyond album is a re-recording of it, thanks to seven musicians called Echo Collective.
Clarke was a founding member of Depeche Mode, Yazoo ( also known as Yaz ) and, of course, Erasure. He talked by phone before hitting the road to Chicago.
Windy City Times: How have you been since the last time we chatted?
Vince Clarke: Things are looking bright. We just got back from South Africa. We have a few weeks off before we start again.
WCT: How was South America?
It was good. The traveling was all right and the shows went really well. You never know what to expect, but Brazil has always been fantastic.
WCT: Do you miss playing smaller venues?
It is just a different feeling, really. We supported Robbie Williams last year and that was a stadium tour. That was surreal, but I prefer shows where I can see people's faces.
WCT: What can we expect as far as this tour?
There is the usual assortment of funny clothes influenced by the Amsterdam Red Light District.
WCT: Talk about Echo Collective and the new music.
What happened was we made the World Be Gone record and that came out the beginning of last year. The record company talked about remixes. I thought rather than take the track and remove some vocals and make it techno, it would be more interesting to have a classical setting to the songs. The record company got onboard.
They got in touch with Echo Collective from Brussels, Belgium. They have no relationship to pop music whatsoever. They made the new arrangements for this record.
Andy went over there just before Christmas to redo the vocals. He worked with them in the studio.
Rather than doing a dance remix album, I felt these songs lend themselves to this kind of setting so that is what happened.
WCT: What was the process of making World Be Gone compared to your past works?
We didn't want to make another dance pop record. We wanted something slow and a bit reflective. I wanted something more cinematic. In the old days Andy did a lot more backing vocals. We decided to go back to that.
Interestingly, the guy who recorded Andy's vocals used to work with Queen. That is why there is a such a big vocal sound on these tracks.
WCT: Does the song "Still It's Not Over" has a LGBT theme to it?
I don't know. Some songs take on meanings as you play them. Like when we wrote "A Little Respect" it didn't mean the same thing now that it means to us or to an audience.
You can't work out how other people will hear your songs. I will think a song is good and record it but then I can't second guess how people like it.
Things change over time as well. Some things mean different things years later.
WCT: But in that song Andy mentions the streets of Castro.
Yes. When we first played San Francisco, it was a new and exciting city. We hadn't played there before. There was a really cool radio station that used to play our records. He was reflecting on that.
WCT: The keyboards sound different. Has your sound changed?
It has not really changed. What has changed is that I will use in the soft synths to work out the arrangements and the melodies. After that I will convert those sounds to analog sounds. My studio is basically an analog studio. The first one I had was very old!
WCT: What is the secret for having a career this long?
The secret is having mutual respect. We don't have to break up and reunited like other acts. We just do it.
WCT: What is something that would surprise people about Andy Bell?
[Laughs] I don't think there is anything that would surprise anybody. Nothing surprises me anymore!
WCT: What have you heard from gay fans in particular at your shows?
The last tour we did in North America we did a meet and greet. People came to say hello and take photographs before the show. The one thing I didn't appreciate then was that people would come up to us and say that a certain song meant huge amounts to them. That it really helped them because they were going through a lot. It was really moving. I hadn't really appreciated it up to that point.
When I saw those people face to face it made me feel really proud.
WCT: Erasure has accomplished so much in [more than] 30 years and things have changed, haven't they?
Things have changed. It is very interesting. There are still battles to be won, but at the same time things are moving on and in a good way I think. Maybe not so much with your particular president right now, but things will be going back up again I am sure.
See Erasure live in Chicago on July 27-28 at the Chicago Theatre, 175 N. State St. Visit ErasureInfo.com for more information.