CHRIS BELL - SPEED OF SOUND

SPEED OF SOUND

CHRIS BELL

SONGWRITER: CHRIS BELL

COUNTRY: U.S.A.

ALBUM: I AM THE COSMO

LABEL: RYKODISC

GENRE: POWER POP

YEAR: 1992

Christopher Branford Bell(January 12, 1951 – December 27, 1978) was an American musician, guitarist, singer, and songwriter. Along with Alex Chilton, he led the power pop band Big Star through its first album #1 Record(1972). He also pursued a solo career throughout the mid-1970s, resulting in the posthumous I Am the Cosmos LP.

All Music Guide praised Bell as "one of the unsung heroes of American pop music" and noted his lasting impression, saying: "Despite a life marked by tragedy and a career crippled by commercial indifference, the singer/songwriter's slim body of recorded work proved massively influential on the generations of indie rockers who emerged in his wake."

His catalog of proto-alternative rock has inspired the likes of Beck, R.E.M., Teenage Fanclub, Primal Scream, Afghan Whigs, Pete Yorn, Wilco, The Posies, and The Replacements, all of which have covered his music or expressed their admiration for Big Star in the press.

His life was documented in the acclaimed Big Star: Nothing Can Hurt Me documentary, released in 2013 on Magnolia Pictures.

In August 2018, Bell's life, and the career of Big Star, was documented in the book There Was A Light: The Cosmic History of Chris Bell and the Rise of Big Star. The 400-page oral-history style bio contains rare interviews with Bell, his band mates, friends, family and notable fans.

I Am the Cosmos is the only solo album by the American pop-rock musician Chris Bell, eventually released in 1992 by Rykodisc, having been recorded over a period of two to three years during the mid-1970s. Bell had previously been a member of Big Star .

In 2009, the album was remastered and re-released in a deluxe two-CD version by Rhino Handmade with alternate versions and additional tracks, and three songs by Bell's pre-Big Star groups, Icewater and Rock City. Some copies included a bonus 7" single of "I Am the Cosmos"/"You and Your Sister", a replica of the original single.

The booklet notes for the album were written by Bell's brother David, who also took the photographs used on the cover and in the CD booklet. The cover features a picture that was taken near Nendaz in Switzerland, it shows the opposite side of the valley with Ardon and the south flank of the snowy massif of Les Diablerets in the back.

The 2017 Omnivore Recordings edition comprises 35 tracks, including eight previously unreleased tracks and two that appear on CD for the first time. Three pre-Big Star tunes that appeared on the 2009 edition are omitted; these are now found on Omnivore's Looking Forward: The Roots of Big Star (also 2017).

I remember the first time

You said you loved me

I waited all weekend

You never called me

So you find him attractive

So what if he is

You'd like some excitement

We could go to St. Kitts

So it goes

On and on

My love grows

And yours is gone

A lonely existence

Well it's just a lie

If there is a reason

I'd like to know why

Something I want you to know

I've told you this once before

Don't want you to see him no more

Once again

You've let me down

Broke my heart

And turned me round

There's a light in the darkness

It doesn't seem far

There's something the matter

That's brought us ajar

The plane goes down

Will not land

Pilot's dead

Nowhere to be found.