Band of Horses: The Eyes Have It

We live in strange times. As our exposure to new music increases exponentially, actual record buying is at risk of becoming antiquated – or so we’re told. The stock rebuttal to this is usually to point to the rise in ticket sales, as the increasing physical isolation of the internet makes us seek more of a tangible community. It’s certainly food for thought for most artists, and Band of Horses main man Ben Bridwell is no different. However, it seems that for Bridwell, technology is even encroaching detrimentally on the live arena.

“The biggest thing that got me at first, which was really unnerving, was that everyone was filming,” Bridwell responds to the initial exposure they received with 2006’s Everything All The Time. “Everyone had a device in their hands, so instead of watching the show, they were watching it through a viewfinder.” However, it’s something that Bridwell, known for berating such fans in the past, has come to terms with. “If you’re going to get grumpy about it then you’re just going to ruin the time for everybody,” he reasons. “So I just try to look for anybody in the crowd who is enjoying themselves with their own eyeballs.”

Talking from Brussels before the second show of a whistle-stop European tour, Bridwell should have no shortage of both types of observers. Critical praise and commercial success have followed them from the beginning, yet surprisingly their path here – which may rankle other musicians – doesn’t phase Bridwell in the slightest. “I feel pretty fucking great about it actually,” he beams on the topic of his music being used extensively in television and advertising.

In part, Bridwell blames this change on the demise in quality of American radio, which he describes with colloquial charm as “garbage”. He continues; “It’s really hard for independent artists or smaller bands to get noticed on the radio, much less sell records, so luckily things like shit sitcoms and movies are becoming the new radio for us over there.” That Bridwell takes to these new avenues with open arms belies the idea of the grumpy Luddite that some may foolishly expect. “At the end of the day, people who maybe wouldn’t have heard of our band, they get to hear us. Any way you can get it out there is positive in my book.”

More traditionally, the third Band of Horses album, Infinite Arms, is on the horizon after a relatively quiet 2009 where Bridwell enjoyed some “down-time” with his wife and child. It also marks their first for Columbia Records, their previous albums having been released by the influential Sub Pop. It’s not the only change according to Bridwell. “It’s a much more of a collaborative effort,” he asserts. “Everybody’s been chipping in ideas and in some cases, chipping in entire songs that they’ve written and even sang lead on, so there’s an obvious progression there.”

And with the band largely assuming the producer’s mantle, Bridwell feels they have been free to colour over the edges, even if only a little. “Because we took the reins and ended up producing the album, we really got to stretch our boundaries without anyone refereeing the session. We could do whatever we wanted. We could get weird if we wanted!” However, he reassures us that things didn’t get too crazy during those sessions. “Maybe it’s not ‘Animal Collective weird’, but for us it was definitely outside of our normal parameters.”

Fans can judge for themselves by catching the band live, camcorder in hand or otherwise, when they play Glasgow in June. “Yeah, we’re really looking forward to it,” says Bridwell with an enthusiasm that permeates our entire conversation. Is there anything he’d like to say to those coming along? “Um, come and say ‘hi’ if you see me,” he suggests. If you really are looking for that ‘connection’ to the music you love, that’s an offer you can’t refuse.