Pink Paper: You’re in New York at the moment, what’s happening over there?
Andy Bell: Well Vince [Clarke, Erasure partner] lives in Maine, so rather than me going up there he comes down to New York so we’ve been writing for the next Erasure record.
PP: Hurrah! That’s what I was going to ask. What can we expect?
AB: Really we’re just writing at the moment so we can’t really tell what it’ll sound like or anything. We’re just getting melody ideas together really because usually the lyrics come afterwards. We just get all the tunes together and we’re just really having a mess about, you know?
PP: What’s inspiring you at the moment?
AB: Errr, I don’t really know. I suppose being here. I’m kind of a lazy person really so I suppose just being here gets you going, you can’t help rushing around everywhere.
PP: How does New York differ from London in that respect though?
AB: I’m staying in the East Village, there’s quite a few bars around here. It’s fairly friendly – not so much in the tourist areas... I suppose in some ways it’s kind of quite small in comparison with London. I don’t really know that many people here. I think in London in some ways you feel more incognito, even though more people know me there I just feel more at home and blend in and stuff. Here, I think because you’re quite a novelty being here, people kind of recognise you and say hi and stuff like that.
PP: Do you get a lot of elitist fan attention?
AB: I wouldn’t say elitist, they’re more kind of train-spotterish I suppose.
PP: I have a confession. At a gig in Edinburgh a few years ago my mother approached you and got you to sign her shoulder...
AB: Oh did she! [Laughs]
PP: And then she got it tattooed on...
AB: [Gasps] Oh no, really? God! Well you sound alright – sounds like she did a good job on you anyway! [Laughs]
PP: So do you get many fans like my mum?
AB: I suppose being on the gay scene it kind of keeps you young because you don’t have children and stuff like that and the younger people get to hear about you more I suppose that in straight circles. So it’s quite strange when someone says ‘oh my grandmother’s a fan’ [laughs]. It makes you feel really old, even though I don’t feel it.
PP: It’s a state of mind though.
AB: It’s a state of mind, yeah definitely.
PP: When you’re gay you kind of forget...
AB: You forget about age completely don’t you? I still feel like a teenager really.
PP: Absolutely! I was out last night at G-A-Y Late and you look around and it’s only when you see how young people are that you remember you’re older.
AB: I know! You don’t realise either, when you’re young and going out and stuff and you think ‘no-one fancies me’ and you’re going round you don’t realise how just being youthful is really attractive [laughs].
PP: Enough, we’re gossiping. I heard there was going to be a second solo album.
AB: There is, it’s all done, it’s ready...
[Lots of exciting chatter about the second album that we can’t talk about just yet, sorry...]
PP: Solo album aside, why choose to remix and re-release The Innocents?
AB: I don’t know, I suppose it’s because it’s our biggest selling record and then with all these people being out that are Vince fans who sound quite Erasure-ish, I think the timing’s quite good. And also because a lot of the young people are really into synth music and for them it’s all really fresh and stuff they hear Erasure, I think it’s really amazing that they hear something that’s already 20 years old but sounds really fresh to them. So we have lots of young fans like Frankmusik and people that like doing mixes of our stuff. I think it makes it sound really current.
PP: Will other albums get a similar treatment?
AB: Well I think it’s all part of the Mute/EMI partnership, because Mute was one of the first brands – before they were even bought by EMI – to do a deal with iTunes. So all this kind of bringing out digital versions of the album is just to put it in cyberspace so people can buy it online and stuff.
PP: With you being abroad have you being following the UK media?
AB: Not for a while I haven’t, I heard a little bit about The X Factor at the weekend and I heard about Stephen Gately, which was really sad... That’s about all I’ve heard really.
PP: There was a piece in the Daily Mail that received over 20,000 complaints which many people felt was homophobic in nature. How have you found things have changed during your profile in the media?
AB: For me it’s all very surface, all this acceptance and tolerance. I think in the general public it’s all pretty cool, you know, with family and friends. But I think the media still has a long way to go. They wear this cloak of political correctness but underneath there’s still this seething homophobia. It’s the same in the music business really. They pretend everything’s all OK, ‘look at this new group’ and ‘aren’t we cool’ but underneath it all it’s still, not very much has changed I don’t think.
PP: That’s pretty horrible.
AB: I know. It’s true though. It’s really, really just by tiny increments do things change.
PP: Right, I need to hurry because I know you have to get somewhere. So very quickly, was it always the plan to go away, record your second album then another Erasure project?
AB: No, not really no. I wanted to have a break from Erasure because it had been 21 years really. With my first solo album I kind of had to cram it inbetween – a little bit like this time although this time I said ‘I need to have a break for a couple of years from doing Erasure because I need to find out a bit who I am outside the band’. I think I have a little bit, so this time it was planned. But Vince always wants to work. So we’re going to do this then go out on tour next year, the end of next year, maybe October. But it just depends on what happens with the solo record. I mean, touch wood, I’m hoping that more people will get to hear about it than the last one. But you never know.
PP: Was there a point where you saw the Yazoo gigs last year and thought ‘sod the break, I want Vince back’?
AB: Not really. I mean I’ve always been slightly envious of Yazoo because I’m a rael fan, I’m a huge fan of Yazoo, that’s way I was a big Vince Clarke fan, and an Alison Moyet fan. Seeing them together it was a great experience. It gave me goose bumps and made me cry. Especially in Brighton. It was really amazing. But at the same time I did take some satisfaction with ‘that man is mine!’ [Laughs] Do you know what I mean? [Laughs]
PP: Is that the longest relationship you’ve had?
AB: Pretty much yeah, it is now. Paul’s still my soulmate, and Vince is the same really.
PP: Three people in that relationship!
AB: Yeah [laughs]
PP: I keep saying I’m going to let you go, but I have to mention the amazing Cyndi Lauper duet you did. Is there anyone else you’d like to work with?
AB: Not at the moment, no. I did do a track with Kate Pearson from the B-52’s which isn’t finished and I did a duet with Perry Farrell which will be on the new solo record. As far as working with people, I love female singers so I wouldn’t mind doing something with Annie Lennox or Debbie Harry. Their voices blend really well together. I wish I could have done something with Kirsty, she was a real sweetheart, Kirsty MacColl.
The Phantom Bride Remix EP and The Innocents re-issue are available now.