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Erasure FAQ

The Andy Bell story

Updated 1 February 2010

Andy’s full name is Andrew Ivan Bell. He was born on 25 April 1964. Jumping ahead to the early eighties, Andy was in a group called The Void for about two weeks; he then split off with the bass player, Pierre Cope, to form their own band, Das Baume (German for The Trees). Later they changed the name to Dinger, that being Andy’s nickname for obvious reasons. They didn’t last long either, but played a few gigs in pubs and so on. They also released one single (Air of Mystery). It wasn’t long after that Andy auditioned for Vince Clarke’s new musical venture, and history was made.
In 1994 he played Judy Garland in a play called The Night We Buried Judy Garland, which was a musical about gay rights. The play ran for a month at the Shaw Theatre in London, but Andy was only in it for a week. He was one of many people who played the part of Judy during the course of the performance. He sang seven Judy Garland songs; no official recordings have been released, but Mute Records apparently has a recording of Reckless in their vaults.

7 responses to “The Andy Bell story”

  1. mignon says:

    i have an mp3 of dinger ” i love to love”.i found it on emule.it’s good but nothing to rave about.his voice is angelic but the music has dated badly.

  2. Bennett says:

    True, it’s not a great song. But the A-side to that single, “Air of Mystery”, is really good. A bit of synth work from Vince and it could easily have fitted into the first Erasure album.

  3. Pierre Cope says:

    I am Pierre, Dingers first partner before he formed Erasure with Vince. Concerning the cheap budget Indy single I love to love – Air of Mystery, may I state that yes the music has dated however, it was written back in 2004 as a rough demo in a 16 track demo studio in Brixton all in just one day. Air of Mystery was another demo produced by Pete Gage and I think he played the keys great. The single was not the work of Erasure and never will be it is just part of Dingers musical history. Dingers material that he does now is great and he has always been a top class artist. I knew the day I auditionned him back in 1982, when he was just 17, that he would make it. Bye Pierre.

  4. Bennett says:

    Thanks for your comments, Pierre. Those songs sound even better now that we know the circumstances under which they were recorded. I still enjoy listening to them now — and surely that’s the mark of a good song.

  5. Pierre says:

    Thanks Mr Bennet, For your words. Yes, at the time the songs which we did were O.K? considering the limitations of cash, age, and experience. By the way, our band was called “Das Baume” (German for “The Trees” with an accent over the “au” pronounced as oy like the name R-oy. The name was Dingers choice not mine.
    May I also add that I am not and never have been homophobic, yes, I frequented many gay bars and clubs with Dinger not a problem for me at all, I never had or will have a problem with the gay community or individual gays. I worked as a science teacher long-time after Erasure was formed, and have met many gay and lesbian professionelles who were and still are superb teachers and remain good friends of mine. The problem is in the UK is that the press and and the media publish whatever thy want to and make money etc. etc. When I was younger Gary Bushell and Rick Sky who worked at the Sun newspaper offered money to do a “Kiss and Tell” Story about Andrew Bell I said F.O

  6. Pierre says:

    Thanks Mr Bennet, For your words. Yes, at the time the songs which we did were O.K? considering the limitations of cash, age, and experience. By the way, our band was called “Das Baume” (German for “The Trees” with an accent over the “au” pronounced as oy like the name R-oy. The name was Dingers choice not mine.
    May I also add that I am not and never have been homophobic, yes, I frequented many gay bars and clubs with Dinger not a problem for me at all, I never had or will have a problem with the gay community or individual gays. I worked as a science teacher long-time after Erasure was formed, and have met many gay and lesbian professionelles who were and still are superb teachers and remain good friends of mine. The problem is in the UK is that the press and and the media publish whatever thy want to and make money etc. etc. When I was younger Gary Bushell and Rick Sky who worked at the Sun newspaper offered money to do a “Kiss and Tell” Story about Andrew Bell I said F.O

  7. Pierre says:

    Correction for the publishing date for Air of Mystery by A Bell in 1984, not 2004 I made a mistake sorry – Pierre Cope

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Erasure FAQ Copyright 1994-2005 Bennett McElwee. All rights reserved. Please ask me before copying any part of it. Thanks!