Band Of Horses Ryan Monroe, keyboardist with Americana troupe Band Of Horses is explaining how the band happened to be playing support to Pearl Jam on eleven shows all around America. "We hired their sound guy," he says cheekily. So, as it turns out, it had nothing to do with the band signing on with a major label, but everything to do with right connections. Yet Band Of Horses certainly have stepped up to the big leagues with their third album, 'Infinite Arms'. It follows two successful releases through indie vets Sub-Pop, with the band electing to begin a dalliance with the world of the majors, signing to Columbia. It's something that heroes and obvious influences My Morning Jacket have done previously, and then found themselves returned to the indie world in future years. "It wasn't really my call," Monroe says with a perceptible shrug, shifting the credit / blame to band leader Ben Bridwell, who has now taken his Band Of Horses through several incarnations before settling on the current line-up. "We ended up going with Columbia because we wanted more of a global stretch for this record so we made sure that nobody would miss it." Bridwell has made much noise about the third album, stating that it is unequivocally the first true Band Of Horses album. It's a contrast to both the debut, Everything All the Time, and its follower, 2007's Cease To Begin, which were much more solo efforts in comparison to the full-band approach employed when making the new album with producer Phil Ek. "I think what he meant by that is that this is the first time we actually had our bass player play the pass parts. On the last record, Rob (Hampton) our old guitarist played all the bass parts because we didn't even have a bass player at that time. When I joined the band there wasn't a bass player, and on the first record it was pieced together by a bunch of musicians that (Ben) knew. "On this record," Monroe continues, "it was the five members that have been on the road together for the last three years or so. It definitely does feel more that a 'band' recorded the record, rather than having to bring in somebody else to play on the songs." 'Infinite Arms' definitely feels like a record made by a group whose performance together has been honed by consistent live touring. There's a comfortable nature to the sound, a relaxed vibe that seems to have permeated from each member being familiar with one another. The album begins with a ballad in the shape of Factory, while Monroe himself sings Older - the first BOH tune not to be sung by Bridwell. "Ben was cool enough to throw in a song of mine and a song by Tyler (Ramsey, guitars) because they were songs that he liked and that we were playing. I think if the song belongs on the record it doesn't really matter who wrote it; I think Ben really liked the idea of having influence coming from all directions. Everyone couldn't be happier- we get along so well and we're having the best time playing together." Most of the songs are of course Bridwell compositions, and were written whilst he was stationed in a cabin in rural Minnesota by the Canadian border. It would seem that everyone is doing their own Bon Iver these days. Most of the songs on 'Infinite Arms' were thus written independently rather than as a collective, with the band communicating electronically, figuring out ideas via email before they got together to work out how it would come to a cohesive whole. "A lot of the demos had string sections and horns and super-elaborate shit like six-part harmonies and crazy shit like that," Monroe explains, "and we had to figure out how exactly we were going to play these songs as Band Of Horses songs instead of these awesome demos. We got together after we'd all put in our views separately because none of us live in the same town - we pass it back-to-back electronically and it's like a world wide web jam going on. "When we get together we flush 'em out and figure out which ones we think are the coolest and then we start to record them. The last record, 'Cease To Begin', there weren't too many songs to choose from but for this one we had thirty-something songs and we had to pare it down. This time there was a lot of leftover material, which is a good thing." Band of Horses' 'Infinite Arms' is out now through Columbia,, with the band touring Australia as part of Splendour in the Grass, as well as playing a sideshow in Adelaide on Thu 22 Jul.  |
Issue 498
Features
