If you’re a lover of music which truly makes you feel something, then you need to be listening to Belle Mt (pronounced Belle Mont).
Combining cinematic alt-pop with natural lyricism and bundles of emotion, Belle Mt have captured the attention of music lovers and critics alike. Earlier this year they released their incredible debut EP Volume 1, a collection of songs which just touch the surface in terms of what they are capable of.
On Saturday, Belle Mt closed the Summer Stage at BST Hyde Park. We caught their performance and left with a new favourite band. Their energy and stage presence took their already great songs to new heights, leaving us, and the rest of the audience, wanting more.
We had the chance to speak to frontman Matt Belmont just before Belle MT’s performance on the Summer Stage and discussed Volume 1, being out on the road, London’s musical influence and more.
You’re closing the Summer Stage today, are you looking forward to your performance?
We’re very excited, yeah! We’ve just been over there chatting to the backstage guys so we’re ready to go! it’s exciting just to be part of this, it’s such a huge thing. I’ve been before as a crowd member and it was amazing.
Earlier this year you released your debut EP Volume 1. How has the response been to that?
It’s been great! It’s had a lot of support from within the industry and it’s had a lot of streams and stuff. It was beyond our expectations for coming out as an unknown [band]. It’s an establishing EP but it went a little further than that for us. It’s been great, I’m delighted with it.
You released a new song every six weeks in the run up to the EP. Why did you choose to do it that way?
Rather than fight against the way people consume music today, I tried to find a model out there which kind of played into the way people listen to things. Also the attention span we all have at the moment, we tend to flip from one thing to another. I think that it’s nice in that level to go with the flow but also for me, it’s nice to be able to give that much attention to each song and feel that it’s not just an album or EP with your lead song and the rest is ‘filler’. There are certain songs on there that I wanted to lead with, ‘Hollow’ for example, which was the first release, but it’s nice to also be able to give attention to the other tracks.
How did you go about choosing which songs made the cut, as we’re sure that you’ve probably got loads more in the wings which could have been released?
Yeah, it was a bit of a back catalogue that I’ve been working on for three or four years. I’ve been writing for and with other people for their projects and I had other songs which were important to me that I set aside. Then I had a writing trip where I co-wrote a lot of songs with my producer, so it was between that batch of songs. I wanted to have an ark to the whole thing, where it wasn’t just four upbeat dancey tracks or four sad songs or four singer-songwriter songs. We chose the songs that we thought would fit together well and would be a good introduction. Also, across the four tracks (there’s six tracks but four songs as two of them are acoustic versions of the other tracks), I feel that it gives an impression of where we lie between. There is a cinematic singer-songwriter track, then there’s songs which I guess echo bands like Coldplay, Bon Iver, Radiohead etc. I think it was a good establisher.
It definitely gives a good all round idea of what you’re about.
Definitely!
You’ve also been out on the road a lot. What are the best and the worst things about touring for you?
The best thing is getting on stage and playing. There’s nothing like it and it makes everything else worthwhile in between. The worst thing I guess would be the waiting around. We’re a support band a lot at the moment, so we’re waiting around as a support act to get our moment to set up and have a soundcheck and then have our moment on stage. It’s the same whether you’re a headline or support act, everyone waits around a lot and everyone is away from home so those are the worst things but it’s definitely worth it.
How would you say that London has influenced your music?
Historically, I’m proud to be from London because of the amazing music that’s come from the city but lately there’s just such a vibrant scene and so many cultural influences. Everything in London from food to art to music has influenced me. It’s made me more eclectic, and it’s also made me raise my bar as a songwriter and performer. I came from a city in the North East of England and there’s great music and musicians there but when I got to London, I thought “oh wow, the standard that people who are trying to do the same as me are at…I better go away and practice and write and write and write!”.
Sadly we’ve run out of time, but before you go can you tell us about your plans for the remainder of the year?
We’ve got some support slots for a band called Kaleo, an Icelandic blues/rock band who are incredible. There’s a Hamburg show and some dates in America. We’ve just finished recording another ten tracks so they’ll gradually start to come out.
Thank you to Matt for his time. Make sure you check out Belle Mt on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
Check out our BST Hyde Park review here and find all of our festival exclusives here.