Claudia Bell, A New Haven Music Mainstay In New Haven New Wave/Punk Era, Dies At 69

Claudia Bell, a mainstay of the original music scene in New Haven during the fertile late 1970s and 1980s as a music journalist and a bass player, died Aug. 14 at the age of 69 after a long bout with cancer. One of her pals and bandmates, Michael Barone, below offers reflections of her and what it meant to be in New Haven at the time.

If it had not been for a fella named Gorman Bechard and his Imagine magazine and record conventions, we may not have ever been graced with the presence of a woman named Claudia Chapman Bell in our lives.

It was 1978, and I lived in the urban wasteland known as Waterbury. I had just graduated from high school, and I was bored, frustrated, and lonely in the oppressive, cultureless dump where I lived. I wanted more and knew I had to get out of there as soon as possible.

I was a music fanatic since I was old enough to work a record player. I was working in the record department of a G. Fox in The Naugatuck Valley Mall where I met a few like-minded individuals — Phil Duarte, Fran Fried, and Gary Soucy — who were also fired up on The Ramones, Elvis Costello & The Attractions, The Clash, The Buzzcocks, as well as ​’60s music. 

One day I ventured into a Rhymes Record Shop in Waterbury and came across for the first time Imagine Magazine with my hero Elvis Costello on the cover. I couldn’t believe that this magazine was actually published in Waterbury. After buying it and reading it from cover to cover about 100 times, I decided I had to meet the people who were putting this magazine out. 

In the fine print was Gorman Bechard’s phone number. I decided to call him one day.

After a long conversation, he invited me to the Imagine office (the basement of his aunt’s house). We quickly bonded over the music we both loved. We became friends and eventually ended up playing music together.

Apparently, Gorman had placed an ad for music writers in the classified section of, I think, Reader’s Digest. Claudia Chapman, who was living in Wolcottville, Indiana, answered the ad.

Claudia was born in Lagrange, Indiana, on Nov. 8, 1952. Claudia’s interest in photography and music melded together when she started attending concerts in Fort Wayne as a teen and photographing acts she went to see. She combined these interests with her writing skills. When she called, she was already publishing the now much sought-after Led Zeppelin fanzine called Pure Blues, so she was no stranger to excellent music journalism and publishing.

I was there when she called the office. For some reason, I spoke with her and found her to be extremely knowledgeable and charming. She was in a marriage that had gone down the drain, was in a hard place emotionally, had two small daughters, and wanted to start her life fresh somewhere else. She decided to visit us in Waterbury.

I believe the first time I met her was at one of the Imagine record conventions, which were like a paradise for music geeks.

She decided to move out to Waterbury, and she became an important part of the magazine, the record conventions, and our band. 

Claudia was always on the scene. She and I became closer and closer, and eventually shared an apartment.

Of course, by this time we were traveling to New Haven quite often, visiting Ron’s Place, The Oxford Ale House, Toad’s Place, and The Arcadia Ballroom.

We saw everybody together, and I mean everybody. We lived, breathed, ate, and slept music. Claudia chronicled most of the shows we went to with her brilliant photography.

She secured a job in the business offices of The Advocate newspapers, a chain of alternative weeklies with a New Haven edition that closely covered the music scene. She began writing music articles for The New Haven Advocate, covering touring and local music shows. Soon she had a weekly ​“Music Notes” column that was a must-read in town for years.

By this time I was working at Cutler’s Record Shop on Broadway in New Haven, and playing music with a guy named Craig Bell and a talented, person named Forrest Harlow. We got Jon March (who had played in a band called Disturbance with me) involved on bass guitar and keyboards, and we called ourselves Future Plan.

Claudia was at all of our rehearsals and gigs being helpful and supportive and soaking it all in. Meanwhile, Claudia and I went to every gig we possibly could and saw bands you could only dream of seeing now.

In a while, Future Plan changed its name to The Plan. Johnny March left the fold, which left us without a bass player. After a short stint with another bass player and several ridiculously frustrating auditions, we realized that the coolest possible person was right there in front of us: Claudia. She already knew the songs. It was as if she almost willed herself to play the bass with us, and she did.

The Plan played everywhere and became a tight little unit, with Claude and me propelling Forrest and Craig to new heights. About two years later, for reasons I don’t remember, Forrest left the band and eventually was replaced by the amazing Tom O’Connell, and we officially became The Bell System.

We played many gigs in New Haven and surrounding cities and states. We played at CBGB’s in New York (as did The Plan). We did radio shows, made videos. Craig wrote the song ​“America Now,” which to my ears is even more powerful and poignant today than it was in 1985.

We kind of took things as far as we could with this lineup and Tom and myself moved on. A new Bell System was reborn a while later.

Craig and Claudia became romantically involved. They were married on June 6, 1986, and they continued to play music together throughout New England and New York until they moved to Indianapolis in 1989, when Craig transferred there in conjunction with his work for the railroad. Back in Indiana, Claudia found work in the book publishing industry and spent 20 years laying out books for multiple publishing houses; she worked on the series of ​“For Dummies” books. After her retirement she freelanced in the industry and also worked again with Craig in a revived version of the band The Rhythm Methodists.

Her years in New Haven were such a rich, eventful, pivotal, time in music, culture, concerts, friendships, journalism, and clothing, and I was fortunate and privileged to have spent it with her.

There is not a single thing I can think of from that era that didn’t involve Claudia.

One thing that will forever entwine the lives of Claudia, Gary Soucy, and me together is that we were together at the exact moment that John Lennon was murdered. Howard Cosell was on TV, and you know the rest. To share something that monumental and traumatic together is like freezing time for eternity.