Lucid-dream pop.
Like naturalists, mushroom hunters and politicians, music journalists are obsessed with putting things in boxes. It may sound lazy, and sometimes even horribly clichéd, but I’m yet to find a quicker and more effective way to describe a band than to say, “x sounds like y doing z”. It’s a frame of reference really, and I think everyone gets it, so that when someone says a band is a hardcore outfit, logic dictates that they’ll probably play really fast and jump around a lot.
Like most people, I kind of think School of Seven Bells fit into the whole shoegaze/dream pop category, but it feels like a bit of stretch. If it bothers me, then it must really irk multi-instrumentalist and band leader Ben Curtis who gets it every day. “I used to be really irritated by genre labels, because I felt like they were used more to keep people out than draw people in,” he sighs when I mention dream pop. “There was always that possibility of somebody saying, ‘I don't like dream pop, so I know I won't like them’, which is ridiculous.”
Then again, being mentioned in the same breath as bands like My Bloody Valentine and the Cocteau Twins can’t be so bad. “I honestly can't think of two better words I'd like to see together than ‘dream’ and ‘pop’. I'm not sure what that label means to other people, but it sounds really enticing to me,” agrees Curtis. “Viewed objectively, I'm really happy with the term used to describe us.”
Formed back in 2007 after Ben walked away from indie rockers Secret Machines, School of Seven Bells have been one of the stand-outs of a group of psychedelic bands experimenting with indie, pop and electronica that emerged from Brooklyn during 2008/2009. “I think our friends have inspired us more than anything,” Curtis says when asked about his decision to start the band. “Blonde Redhead have been a huge inspiration for us. They're deep in to a really great career in making music, and they've never compromised their vision. It's something I definitely aspire to.”
With their first album ‘Alpinisms’ topping a lot of people’s 'Best of 2008' lists, their recently released second album is always going to be a hard sell. “I'm resigned to the fact that there's just a type of person out there that will react negatively for every band's second record, saying it's not as good as the first,” he says, being diplomatic in the face of the dreaded second album question. “Luckily, that opinion seems to be in a minority, which is a testament to how amazing our fans are.”
When you’re in a band that invests such a massive amount of effort into creating particular ambiences and soundscapes, this might sound like sheer bravado, but Curtis seems genuinely unfazed by the pressure of being liked: “it was really impossible for me to think about, since that entire train of thought is pretty much a creative black hole,” he explains, adding that “the second record for us is a slightly different situation than most, because I've always felt that, from the beginning, we were building to the point of making ‘Disconnect From Desire’. I feel like it's all starting from here really”.
And he means it. Whirlwind success leads to constant touring and less time to write songs, so most of the time a band’s second album is often either a collection of hurriedly written tracks penned in hotel rooms or motorway service stations, or released so long after the first, that it completely fails to capitalise on the initial excitement. ‘Disconnect from Desire’ bucks the trend by being neither. Released a mere two years after their debut, it sees School of Seven Bells move in more poppy, and some would say danceable, directions.
Asked about the obvious differences to their first record, Ben is fairly philosophical. “We made a conscious decision on 'Disconnect From Desire' to turn the focus inward, and to make an SVIIB record that is very much down to earth, and personal,” he says contemplatively, “but at the same time, I think touring tuned us into this certain ecstatic quality of our music, that I think we weren't quite as aware of before we started playing out so much. We really fell in love with this feeling, and it shows in the music.”
I think that ‘Disconnect from Desire’ has all the hallmarks that make School of Seven Bells one of those truly great, barrier-busting bands. Whilst obviously building on the past, this is a band that is way too left-of-centre ever to be considered as simple shoegaze revivalists. “You can call me anything you want,” shrugs Curtis when I suggest that we invent a new genre to describe his band. “It won't change what I do.”
School of Seven Bell's single 'Heart is Strange is released today on Full Time Hobby and the album 'Disconnect From Desire' is out now. The band themselves will be playing a show at Heaven on the 4th of November.
http://www.sviib.com/
Click here for more London Live Music
Add an event
Frieze Art Fair to launch new section for young galleries in 2012
Frieze have today announced details for the 2012 edition, their tenth art fair in London. Taking place...