Bellafea goes into beast mode

Shuffle Magazine, issue #2. http://www.morisen.com/ShuffleVol2.pdf

Bellafea goes into beast mode
In person, Bellafea is an unassuming trio. Polite. Soft spoken. Gentle, even.

But on record? Sharp, full-bodied, dynamic and visceral. And live? Monsters.

What started in 2001 as the duo of singer/guitarist Heather McEntire and drummer Nathan Buchanan practicing in Buchanan’s parents’ home in Wilmington, N.C., has, as of January, 2007, grown to include Fin Fang Foom’s Eddie Sanchez on bass.

“It’s taken a long time to become a three-piece,” says McEntire. “We had to find the right person,” she adds with a smile.

And it’s changed the sound, too. Not only by adding “muscle and texture,” as McEntire describes it, but in the rhythmic approaches as well.

“I used to chase the vocals a lot,” says Buchanan. “Now I’m trying to work more with Eddie.”

The new sound is bolder and fuller without losing any of the bristling angularity that helped make the earlier recordings – like 2004’s six-track EP, Family Tree (Pidgeon English) — so powerful.

And there’s still the important constant of McEntire’s meticulous writing. Having studied creative writing at UNC-Wilmington, she blends metaphor with autobiographical specificity to
create powerful narratives from poignant slivers of life.

“I’m successful at writing a song when the music and lyrics click together, and it feels like a genuine representation of that moment,” she says.

And in May, the band will reveal the newfangled trio version of itself with their much-anticipated full-length, Cavalcade (Southern Records), named for the ideas of plurality and collaboration that went into its creation.

On the LP, Bellafea is joined by a legion of musical friends, notable enough to be considered a selling point. But the band is careful not to be defined by its associates, or solely on the strength of its recorded output.

Bellafea is determined to let its dynamic time-bomb of a stage show be the measuring stick.
It’s a good one, too, with Buchanan and Sanchez providing a thick, heavy low-end to McEntire’s excitable presence behind the microphone.

However Bellafea is to be measured, though, this is the time for it, as plans for extensive touring in support of Cavalcade and a follow-up in 2009 begin to materialize. BRYAN REED

Shuffle Magazine, issue #2. http://www.morisen.com/ShuffleVol2.pdf