|
|||
| |
|||
Articles |
||
|
|
Erasure's Union Street Breaks New Ground
Duo Prepare for First-Ever Acoustic Tour in the US
Erasure, however, is a completely different story. After two decades of chart-topping pop music and over-the-top performances, Vince Clark and Andy Bell have decided to unplug. Trading in the keyboards for a guitar, the duo recorded Union Street, bringing soulful new depths and acoustic textures to 11 songs spanning their entire career. The new album Union Street was recorded in the Brooklyn studio of the same name, which is owned by guitarist Steve Walsh. Walsh is currently assembling musicians for Erasure's first ever live-band tour. "We found this cool guitarist with a cool studio and decided to use both," says Vince. The album is dominated by revamped album tracks and born-again B-sides that the band felt best suited an extreme makeover. All sound refreshingly different to their original blueprints. "It was great going back through those songs, some of which I hadn't listened to properly since we made them," Vince recalls. "Suddenly you heard some of the naivety that was in there in the first place." The pared-down, organic textures of Union Street also create enough space for Andy to showcase the richer, more soulful depths of his vocal range. "It makes such a difference singing with acoustic instruments," Andy says. "There's more space, it seems. When you're using electronics they soak up part of the voice. Whereas with strings, the voice seems to vibrate off of them." Andy's mournful timbre on the languid, heartbroken "Piano Song" and the strikingly stark, regretful ballad "How Many Times" are pure Nashville Noir. "We're going to be the first band ever to cross over from pop to country," Andy jokes. But these reinvented versions of familiar Erasure tunes show that truly strong lyrics and melodies transcend labels like 'pop' or 'country'. Vince Clark says it best. "We just felt there were songs on our albums that had been missed as songs."
Erasure Tour Dates
5/6 Nashville, TN @ Ryman Auditorium |
|
What exactly is a pop band without the pop? Take away the synthesizers, and the soundtracks, most current pop bands would suffer a fate even worse than that of Ashley Simpson on Saturday Night live. Not a pretty picture.