Chris Bell (American musician)
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Chris Bell (January 12, 1951 – December 27, 1978) was a singer, songwriter, and guitarist born in Memphis, Tennessee. Along with Alex Chilton, he led the power pop band Big Star, which recorded albums during the early 1970s. Chris Bell left the group after their first album, #1 Record, but contributed some music and lyrics to their second LP, 1974's Radio City. He recorded as a solo artist for the remainder of the 1970s; two of these influential solo recordings, "I am the Cosmos" and "You and Your Sister," were released on a 1978 single on Car Records.
Bell had played in a number of Memphis bands beginning in the 1960s, prior to his later famous work in the 1970s with Chilton. He had started playing music at age 12, influenced heavily by the Beatles and other British Invasion groups like The Yardbirds and The Who. One of his early groups included Memphians Richard Rosebrough and Terry Manning, with whom he continued to work for the rest of his music career. In 1964 and 1965, Bell played lead guitar in a British Invasion-influenced group called the Jynx (the name is a takeoff on The Kinks) with local musicians, including lead vocalist Mike Harris, rhythm guitarist David Hoback, drummer DeWitt Shy, and bassist Bill Cunningham. Other lead vocalists at some of the group's shows and rehearsals, though not present on their recordings, included local teens Ames Yates, Vance Alexander, and Chilton. Chilton, who attended nearly every Jynx show and sang lead vocals for a couple of weeks, soon joined the Box Tops with Cunningham, as the Jynx split up in 1966. Bell continued to perform and record in Memphis throughout the rest of the decade, turning his focus more toward writing original songs by the late 1960s.
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Big Star begins
The group later known as Big Star stemmed from two Bell band projects that began in the late 1960s when he was recording and performing live in groups named Icewater and Rock City. These groups featured a revolving set of musicians including Jody Stephens, Terry Manning, Tom Eubanks, Andy Hummel, Richard Rosebrough, Vance Alexander, and Steve Rhea. Recordings by these groups appear on the various artists collection Rockin' Memphis 1960's–1970's Vol. 1 and Rock City, released in 2003.
Chilton was asked by Bell to join several months after the group had started performing. Eventually the group, during a period of recording demos and tracks for their first album, settled on naming the group "Big Star." The lineup for Big Star's first album was composed of Bell (guitars/vocals), Chilton (guitars, vocals), Hummel (bass, vocals), and Stephens (drums, vocals). Bell and Chilton wrote most of the group's songs, with occasional writing contributions from Hummel and Stephens. Bell was even more influenced by the music of the British Invasion than Chilton, whose subsequent career has seen him turn toward soul music, country, punk rock (producing The Cramps), R&B, and European pop. Bell steadfastly retained his Beatles-oriented pop influences throughout his career.
Along with Ardent Studios founder John Fry and engineer Terry Manning, Bell is credited with much of the mixing and engineering work done on the first Big Star album, #1 Record. After this album failed to find commercial success (due to confusion by its soul-oriented distributor Stax in marketing the album), Bell left the band in 1972 and began a struggle with intense depression that gripped him off and on for the rest of his life, stemming partly from his repressed homosexuality and dependence on heroin; both of which he tried to deal with through his strong belief in Christianity. Bell's brother David has also written of Bell's need to branch out from being in the shadow of his more famous bandmate, Chilton, as another reason for Bell's departure. David Bell also reported a brief reunion during the recording of Big Star's second album, Radio City, which led to Bell's collaborating with the group members to write a couple of songs on the album, including "O My Soul" and "Back of a Car."
Solo work after Big Star
Bell began to concentrate on solo work after leaving Big Star, recording demos at Ardent Studios and Shoe Recording in Memphis with old friends including Rosebrough, Manning, Cunningham, Ken Woodley, and occasionally Chilton and Jim Dickinson. One of Bell's better known solo songs from this period is "You and Your Sister," featuring Bell's guitarwork and vocals, Chilton's backing vocal, and Cunningham's string arrangements and bass work. Bell also began playing in a group with local songwriter Keith Sykes in the 1970s.
During the late 1970s, a few of Bell's pop song lyrics began to evince influences from his newfound interest in Christian spirituality. He worked at his father's restaurant as he continued to grapple with clinical depression. Although he released a single in 1978 on the Car Records label, none of his solo material was released on a full length album during his lifetime.
Bell died in December 1978 when he lost control of his small Triumph TR-7 sports car, sometime after 1 a.m. on the morning of the 27th, on his way home from his family's restaurant in East Memphis. The car struck a wooden light pole on the side of the road, killing him instantly. His funeral was held the next day, December 28th, the birthday of former bandmate Chilton.
Influence
Bell's music and that of Big Star became popular with alternative rock musicians in the 1980s through word of mouth. Eventually, well known artists including R.E.M., Ian Moore and The Replacements began touting the recordings of Big Star as significant works. This Mortal Coil, which had earlier recorded versions of post-Chris Bell Big Star songs, recorded versions of "I Am the Cosmos" and "You and Your Sister". Finally, almost 14 years after his death, the songs from his Car Records single and several of his other 1970s recordings were released on 1992's I Am the Cosmos full-length CD on Rykodisc. Big Star's pop gem "In the Street," which had featured the tight harmonies of Bell and Chilton, was chosen as a representative song of the 1970s decade by the producers of the television show That '70s Show in 1998. Cheap Trick recorded a version of the song for the show with revised lyrics in 1999, also included on That '70s Show Presents That '70s Album: Rockin'.
Bell has recently been featured on the album Late Night Tales: The Flaming Lips. His song "Speed of Sound" is the third track on the album. "Speed of Sound" is also heard over the opening credits to the Peter Sollett film Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist.
Discography
- The Jynx
- Greatest Hits! — (Norton Records, 10-inch vinyl EP, 2000)
- Various artists: Garage Beat '66, Vol. 2: Chicks Are for Kids! — (Sundazed Music CD, 2004)
- Icewater and Rock City
- Various artists: Rockin' Memphis: 1960s–1970s, Volume 1 — (Lucky Seven Records CD, 2003)
- Rock City — (Lucky Seven Records CD, 2003)
- Big Star
- #1 Record — (Ardent Records LP, 1972)
- Radio City — (Ardent Records LP, 1974)
- Solo
- "I Am the Cosmos"/"You and Your Sister" — (Car Records single, 1978)
- I Am the Cosmos — (Rykodisc LP, 1992)
