Q&A: BEL Raises the Bar With Her Fiery New Self-Love Single “Woman on Fire”
BEING AN INDEPENDENT ARTIST IS ABOUT AS VULNERABLE AS IT GETS — and something that indie singer-songwriter BEL is no stranger to. She writes her own music, creates her own marketing campaigns, and acts as her own publicist and social media manager, all on top of performing and releasing her music. Painstakingly dedicated to getting her art out into the world, BEL does so with a level of humor and intentionality that is insuring; she is serious about her music but finds room for play.
It’s been a little over a month since BEL released “Woman on Fire,” and since then she’s announced that she is going on tour with Boyish, performed a SiriusXMU Session, and reached number one on the SiriusXMU chart for “Are You Okay?” In a nutshell, BEL is proving to other fully independent artists that by working hard and surrounding yourself with supportive, inspiring people, you can slowly achieve your goals and make an impact on your listeners' lives.
Talking to BEL was equally thought-provoking and relieving, a reminder that there is still space for independent artists in the ever-evolving music industry, which has become increasingly fast-paced and transactional as music streaming dominates the market.
Luna sat down with BEL to discuss the release of and inspiration behind “Woman on Fire.” Read below to learn more about BEL and the work that goes into releasing her songs, from start to finish.
LUNA: First of all, congratulations on the release of your latest single, “Woman on Fire”! As a fully independent artist, I am incredibly impressed with the way you market and release your work. Describe to me the process that went into releasing “Woman on Fire,” from writing, recording, and producing the song to writing the press release and reaching out to publications.
BEL: So I co-wrote and I made this song with Alexander Flockhart. I wanted to write a song to give myself confidence in moments when I feel like I'm not going to have it, inevitably, because this is such a difficult career path. I think especially as a woman, there's just a lot of second-guessing that happens.
I wanted something that felt more like I'm fully confident in what I'm doing, even if I don't feel that way all the time. So I worked with my friend SJ Spreng … she did all the visuals. I met her on my previous project and now we're really good friends, and she's really good. She just really gets me. So we'll sit down and listen to the songs and talk through what we want the visual to be. For this one I thought, I want this to be like the alter ego of BEL — the one that just doesn't give a shit and is setting things on fire.
So that was the direction for that visual. I think the song is a lot about the different experiences I've had with men and with the feeling of when you're finding your image as an artist and there's the male gaze — just everything that kind of is involved with that, and finally finding the confidence to say, “This is my body, this is what I'm comfortable with, this is what I want to do, and I'm not doing it for anybody else.”
LUNA: It seems like you try to work with people who are either your friends or who, at the very least, make you feel super comfortable — from writing the song to having it marketed with a friend who knows your image and who you feel gets you. I think that's really great advice. This is a great example of how your team can be your kin as well.
BEL: Yeah, absolutely. I believe that, definitely. SJ has been a huge part of this rollout. She and my other friend Caroline helped style me for the photos. So it just feels really good to have these amazing, talented women around me [who] are helping me as well. I'm just really lucky and proud of them.
LUNA: I love to hear when friends are working together. You can tell when a song is made with not just skill and talent but also with a level of fun and play. And I hear that in this song — it's clear that you had fun while you were making it.
BEL: Thank you.
LUNA: Did you study music formally, or are you self-taught?
BEL: Both, I guess. In college I did communications, and then there’s a music industry minor that I did. It was really great. I loved a lot of the classes I took, but there was this underground audio engineering class in the film school that a lot of musicians would do. It was in the film school — they have a scoring stage and this awesome professor there, Dave McKenna, holds these classes on Friday nights for any student [who] wants to learn audio engineering and learn how to engineer themselves and place mics and all these different things. But I did that, and there were different levels of the class and I just kept advancing to each level. They had this special program where they took the advanced class to Capital Studios and we got to record a couple of different types of settings. We got to record a band, and then we recorded a string section and things like that.
I got some formal training in that area, but I don't really know music theory that well. I've taken a few classes and it's just like in one ear out the other. It's helpful for certain things, definitely. But my main instrument growing up was the violin. I learned violin and did orchestra for, like, 12 years and then I just taught myself guitar when I was 15 — and the rest is history. I guess my real first instrument was when I was really little. I did piano lessons but I really didn't like my teacher so I quit. So yeah, guitar is my main instrument that I write on, and I'm self-taught… And piano — I also write and do some producing with that, but it's also just self-taught.
LUNA: I love that! Do you think you would ever pick up the violin again for one of your tracks?
BEL: Maybe. I did in college. I put a song out on SoundCloud and I had violin on it that I recorded, but I think I should pick it up again because I do really miss it. I think that doing orchestra ingrained that discipline in me for sure. Because it was like I have to practice or I'm going to look like an idiot, if I go to this rehearsal and I don’t know what to do.
LUNA: Totally, and I bet it was also good to learn how to collaborate with other musicians early on.
BEL: Yeah, it was huge, for sure. I really loved that. That was definitely my first taste of being in an artist community, and I was really just enamored by it and I knew I wanted to be around it. It was awesome.
LUNA: That's when you got hooked.
BEL: Really, it really was. We did this orchestra trip in the summer and we came to LA. I'm from Clovis, California, the Fresno area. We came to LA and we played at Disney Hall, and we were all staying in a hotel and hanging out in each other's hotel rooms and I was like, “Wow, we're all just musicians and we're traveling” — I was like, “I want to do this.”
LUNA: And now you are! As a kid, what did you dream of being when you grew up?
BEL: Essentially, I always wanted to be a singer. I would make songs with my older sister, and in my head I didn't really know I was going to be a songwriter too because I was just like, “I love singing; I love to sing.” And my sister was really good with words and writing songs too, and so she would kind of write little songs and I would sing them and I was like, “Okay, cool, so I'm going to be a pop star and someone will write songs for me” — that kind of thing. But I also really loved doing theater growing up so I also thought I wanted to be an actress, but definitely is not really my vibe anymore. I'm fully in the music now.
LUNA: How do you find inspiration in your daily life as a songwriter? How do you break through writer's block?
BEL: That's a good question. I feel like my songwriting is very conversational… I like to pick from specific situations that have happened to me or embellish on them. And I'm usually just writing a bunch of random things in my Notes app all the time. I think just trying to be more present so that I can absorb what's happening around me and write it down and then write something funny about it, usually. But when I'm having a block, I think I'll try to go for a walk. And especially if I'm in a session and we're stuck on something, I usually just try to get outside for air and then kind of switch up the energy, and I have so many random Notes, like little things written here and there…
Usually if I'm blocked, I'll just scroll through the thousands of notes and find one thing that finally makes me feel something and I'll kind of run with that. But yeah, being blocked is one of the hardest things ever, for sure. It's very scary.
LUNA: Totally. I love that you said that. It is a very scary feeling. It's not always talked about as such — a lot of times it's framed as just being frustrating because you can't get something out. But it's kind of nerve-wracking and scary when you're like, “I know I have stuff in here but I can’t express it in the way that I want to express it.”
BEL: Yeah, I was talking to my therapist last week, actually … I had this realization that I was filtering myself and that's why I was getting blocked. It’s because I was like, “Oh, I've already said something about this in a song before, so I can't say it again” Or like, “How [do] I put pressure on myself to write songs that are totally different from what I've written before or on topics that I haven't written before?” And sometimes that can get me stuck because it's like, well, I am experiencing this, so why can't I write about it again? That kind of thing.
LUNA: Yeah, you can't censor yourself. If it's coming out, it’s coming out.
BEL: Yeah, exactly. It's definitely a scary time, for sure. Because it's one of those things where if I write a song that I really like, I sometimes can't enjoy it because I'm like, “Oh, I'm never going to write a song I like again. I'm never going to write a song like this.” But it always changes.
LUNA: Who are other independent artists that you look up to?
BEL: It's so hard because there are so many … I mean, a lot of my friends are independent artists and I'm such a big fan of all of them. I really love… I don't know, there's a lot, wow, this is a hard question.
I am really inspired by … my friend Wilby … she's in Nashville but she came to LA a couple of months ago, and I met her through another independent artist friend girlhouse, [who] I love. And I'm just inspired by both of them. Honestly, their energy and the way that they create … [they’re] just very intentional. I guess that's also something that I look up to, when artists are really intentional with what they make and how they put it out, and they're both just really funny too, and we just goof around. So I guess … I enjoy being with artists that feel like I've known for a long time. That's always a cool feeling, when I meet an artist who I'm a fan of, and I feel like, “Oh, we're friends already right away,” that kind of thing. But yeah. What was the rest of the question?
Wilby’s been really helping me … we started the Artist's Way together. I don't know if you've heard of that. And she's been really helping me stay motivated to keep on it because this is my third time doing it. I've fallen off each time, and this time I'm really determined to finish it. And we'll text each other every morning and be like, “morning pages.” So it's really nice to have this other artist that is keeping me accountable, and I'm keeping her accountable, and, I don't know, it just is really nice. We inspire each other.
LUNA: What are you looking forward to over the next few months in terms of your upcoming projects, live events, or other creative endeavors?
BEL: I'm going to be supporting Boyish on their tour in June — that's definitely something I'm very excited about. I'm excited to keep putting more music out. I have a few other songs up my sleeve that I'm going to be putting out soon. I am playing my first festival in August — it's Mind the Gap Festival in Salt Lake City. So I'm just excited for this year. This year feels really good — just starting it off, putting out music, and it just feels good to be in that creative cycle again.
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