Band Of Horses: A New Beginning

Losing a founding member can be the pinnacle moment of a bands career. Do you fall at the waist side and tumble into obscurity or do rise from the ashes and become something even greater. Do you become AC/DC after losing Bon Scott or INXS after losing Michael Hutchence? South Carolina based group Band Of Horses have conquered their own band member difficulties and managed to produce new album ‘Cease To Begin’.

Last year, following the release of debut album ‘Everything All The Time’ Mat Brooke left to focus on his other band Grand Archives. However, the closing of one door led to another one opening as lead singer Ben Bridwell explains: “The big change on the album came when a childhood friend of mine, Ryan Monroe, came in to play piano with us on our demos, then we realised we had to snatch him up. Now he’s in the band and plays on the record. His influence is pretty awesome.”

‘Cease To Begin’ is described as "derivative cosmic indie pop" by Bridwell, who began writing the album over the course of the past year. “I’d been writing while on tour all year then all of a sudden I kind of realised I had enough material for a record.” Speaking of his proudest moment on the album Bridwell picks out ‘Ode To LRC’. A song derived from true events. “It was one of the first times I’d ever sat down and written a song beginning to end in like an hour or two. I enjoyed it because it was so begging to be written that I didn’t really have to work on it too hard.”

Heading back into the studio to write the follow up to your debut album is a tall order and one that Bridwell found surprisingly easier the second time round. “On the first record I’d danced around a lot of subjects and you couldn’t really tell too much of what I was talking about, but on this record it’s really a lot more straight forward. I wasn’t as afraid to just go ahead, and if people didn’t get what I was saying I didn’t really care. I wasn’t as nervous.”