Stereo Embers The Podcast 0350: Sandy Bell

“Entelechy”

The work of the Ohio-born Sandy Bell is pure magic. I guess by now, you’re getting the feeling I’m a big admirer of what she does. But the work that we’re talking about which is so effortless and beautiful, was hard-fought and the journey to get where we are today with Sandy’s songs, was fraught with some pretty heavy stuff. We’ll let her tell you all about that, but along the way, she went West as many do, and along the way found herself writing songs with Jeff Buckley, which many….don’t. She also fronted a band that was on the cusp of some potential ’90s glory before she ghosted them, and as she dug her heels into L.A. life, she was also battling deeply serious addiction issues and for a while slipped way off the grid and was living off Hollywood Blvd and grappling with demons that were in a full-time flex of trying to destroy her. But they didn’t. Moving to New York with her partner and producer Jeff Lipstein, Bell was revived, rejuvenated and ready to be the artist she was meant to. Her first album When I Leave Ohio is a stone cold stunner–it has the stillness of a Hopper painting and all the raw loneliness of Nick Drake. The follow up, Entelechy, which is a phrase borrowed from Aristotle, which refers to ‘’That which realizes or makes actual what is otherwise merely potential,” is, quite simply, one of the best records you’ll ever hear. Atmospheric, mesmeric and emotive, Entelechy is a textured song cycle that explores devastation and darkness with the probing eye of a philosopher and the atmospheric lens of a filmmaker. In other words, think David Lynch collaborating with Plato on music that sounds like Karen Dalton fronting the Bad Seeds. It’s regenerative, restorative, terrifying, comforting and powered by an enormous heart that beats with hope. Sandy has collaborated with everyone from Rachel Yamagata to Bat For Lashes and now, she’s collaborating with us.

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