Clarice & Bean performed at The Albany as part of PureGold

Set round a campfire, Clarice & Bean, vampire-hunting girl scouts, are putting on the best live show of their whole lives with help from Count Dracula and Baby Bean, their alien bandmate (and greatest alien rockstar in the universe).

A woman in a pink top and black beret playing guitar and singing into a microphone

A woman in a yellow dress and beret wearing a sash and playing the keyboard and singing into a microphone

Taking inspiration from children’s author Lauren Child (known for the ‘Charlie and Lola’ and ‘Clarice Bean’ series) for their band name, Anna Routley and Willa Coode-Robins (both BMus Popular Music students) initially had no other bandmates to form their group with, and so created ‘Baby Bean’, their fictional third member – who started life as a plushie toy.

Musically drawing on teen bands like Hanson and The Jonas Brothers, as well as twee-pop All Girl Summer Fun Band, the pair started making imaginary worlds within their music as a form of escapism. Once they had established the aesthetic and narrative of the girl scouts, the story grew from there – and they wanted to see how far they could push it, becoming vampire-hunting girl scouts.

We wanted to make pop music inspired by tweenie pop and we thought, how could we make our music as annoyingly catchy as possible? We want to be really fun, provide a form of escapism and for audiences to feel safe, welcomed and included.

For Anna and Willa, the fictional narrative is a way of having fun and taking away seriousness – making performing more enjoyable, and less frightening. Their visual aesthetics reflect the interdisciplinary nature of their practice – they both also love making art, clothes and comics, and are fans of skateboarding and horror. They have a handmade ‘Baby Bean’ plushie and costumes for their performances, and plan to release an accompanying zine.

The band on stage around a cardboard campfire. There is a person dressed up as a blue alien, and another dressed up as a vampire, and two women dressed as girl scouts - one has a guitar, and one is stood by a keyboard. There are other bandmates in the background.

The band has grown from being just two people, with an acoustic guitar and synth, to a full band set up — finally getting the bigger sound Anna and Willa always wanted. Liv Balchin (BMus Popular Music) joins on bass, Joe Stephen (BMus Popular Music) on lead guitar and Claudine Schutte (BA Media and Communications) on drums. For the duo, a key part of the process has been figuring out how their fictional world can be communicated to the audience through theatrics - using props, costuming, lighting, and AV.

Clarice & Bean performed at The Albany as part of PureGold, the annual festival that celebrates and showcases the work of Goldsmiths music students.