On the Road Again: Erasure promises 12-inch career mix

Everybody dance now: Erasure singer Andy Bell describes the British synth-pop duo's forthcoming album The Violet Flame as a dance record. So when he and keyboardist Vince Clarke set out on a North American tour beginning Friday night in Miami, it's only appropriate that their set follow suit. "The new show is like 12-inch mixes of our original singles" such as A Little Respect and Chains of Love, says Bell, who'll certainly be dressed for the occasion. "My new outfit is kind of Dickensian disco."

Come and see the show: Bell, 50, grew up the oldest of six children in Peterborough, England. "We didn't have much money, so you had to make your own entertainment," he says. Even as a youngster, Bell felt up to the task of showman, setting up a stage in the family's backyard, putting chairs in rows, even creating handmade rolls of tickets. "I didn't understand why nobody came. I didn't realize you had to have advertising for your shows. I thought people would just walk by, come in and sit."

The importance of wearing pants: In Erasure's earliest days, Bell had trouble shaking the notion that he was following in the footsteps of Alison Moyet, Clark's singer in Yazoo (known as Yaz in the U.S.), which left him feeling vulnerable and exposed. Sometimes it wasn't just a feeling. At one of the first Erasure shows at a U.K. club called Heaven, "I had this bodysuit on, which was completely see-through, and no pants," he says. "I had three pairs of tights, which I thought would cover up my modesty. It didn't."

Brazilian whacks: In 1997, Erasure toured as support for David Bowie, but the audience at the Close Up festival in Sao Paulo, Brazil, wasn't interested. "We were getting pelted by bottles of water and all kinds of things," Bell says. "The audience was mooning us by getting on each other's shoulders and pulling down their pants. I was a bit scared; sometimes, it can feel like they're baying for your blood. I thought maybe David put us on to soak up the homophobia before he came out. But he's like a rock god, so that wasn't the case. It was just my imagination."

Mother Mary goes with him: In his passport, Bell carries a photocopy of a Polaroid photo of the Virgin Mary appearing in the sky. "I take it with me everywhere, even though I'm not a religious person," he says. "It's a full-on color picture of her. I take that with me. It makes me feel safe."

Premature farewell: In the late '90s, Clarke and Bell vowed they'd never tour again. Bell says those feelings came after several years of touring practically non-stop. "You get to a breaking point where you think, 'I'm not possibly going to do this again.' " However, he adds, "After a month, I start twitching, I start twiddling my thumbs, thinking, 'Maybe I should just go and do a bit of DJing up the road in a pub.' I start getting itchy feet."