“I suppose the thing that surprises me most is how bang on some reviewers are to our intentions,” Liam says, “Some have delved even further than us, and have come out with some incredibly lush sounding descriptions of what they see and hear from our music. That’s what really gets you excited as the artist.”
The band fled to a small town in rural New South Wales to make the record last year, and hoped to evoke their isolated and eerie surrounds in a psychedelic collision of guitars.
“We wanted to create characters and situations, but not make it too obvious or too much like a concept album. On the other hand, we wanted the album to play out kind of like an audio road movie – or perhaps a fitting companion to your own dusky, haunted road trip,” Liam explains, “I think it’s the kind of album that people can lose themselves in, and come out the other end with their own interpretation.”
Crystal Theatre represents a more refined sound for Belles Will Ring, a distinct progression from the wall of sound aesthetic on 2007’s Mood Patterns. Liam describes the difference as the band “playing less”, being more selective with their instrumentation, more experimental with their song structures and more grandiose with their melodies. Some of the songs on the record have been part of the Belles Will Ring set for at least two years, and have taken on a richer character in the recording process. Other tunes were road-tested at the Big Sound Festival in Brisbane last year and at The Church’s show in Sydney (where Belles Will Ring featured as a support act). The response was fantastic, giving the band confidence that their new approach was working.
Belles Will Ring will launch a national tour to promote Crystal Theatre in Melbourne (“Because we love you the best”), at the Workers Club this Friday 1 July. Fans can expect their standard lush and glittering performance, with a few added effects to accommodate the new songs.
“There are way more instruments on stage,” Liam says. “We make use of that with the older songs too sometimes – bringing some of the new sounds to the old.”
When they’re done here, Belle With Ring strike out for South Australia and Queensland before winding up back in their adopted home town of Sydney a couple of weeks later. They’re primed for the trip.
“The best thing is that it’s your own road trip with some of your closest buddies – it’s an adventure. Crazy shit sometimes goes down; often there is incredible amounts of laughing. You get to listen to music together – you’re not often in a situation that lends itself to that, but it’s a really great thing. The bummer is food. You start feeling unfit very quickly due to the amount of garbage food you are forced to consume on the road. On a brighter note,” Liam smiles, “We’ve been doing this long enough now to know what towns to turn off onto to get good food.”
