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Evan Nicole Bell on Breaking Expectations and Creating Her Own Path

Edward Schooley
Posted: October 19, 2026
Creating your own path is the default, not an act of rebellion.

Photo credit: Joanna Tillman

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EDITOR IN CHIEF | GUITAR THRILLS MAGAZINE TAMPA, FL U.S.A.

Edward Schooley

Founded in 2021. GUITAR THRILLS MAGAZINE of Tampa, FL Guitar Thrills Magazine of Tampa, FL U.S.A. The GUITAR THRILLS MAGAZINE is excited to bring you some of the music industries finest talent. Including the world of entertainment. Our focus includes the long term goals and aspirations of artists of all sorts. We are an unbiased reporting platform. You are getting insight into the world of music. No, we are not your fathers website for music news. We have grown into our own, and rely upon decades of music experience and knowledge. Guitar Thrills Magazine is a hard act to follow.

There has never been a shortage of formulas in music. Find a sound that works. Follow the trend. Give the audience what it expects. Build the image, protect the image, and never stray too far from the version of yourself that people have already decided they understand.

But for artists who are serious about creating something that belongs to them, formulas can become a limitation.

Evan Nicole Bell represents a different approach—the idea that an artist doesn't necessarily have to fit neatly into an established category to have something worth saying. There is freedom in refusing to let expectations become instructions, and there is something compelling about an artist willing to discover her direction rather than simply accepting one that has already been mapped out.

Creating your own path sounds simple until you must do it.

Music is filled with comparisons. Artists are routinely asked who they sound like, what genre they belong to, what influences shaped them, and where they fit within an increasingly crowded landscape. Those questions can be useful, but they can also become boxes. Once an artist is placed inside one, there is often an expectation that everything that follows should remain there.

For Evan Nicole Bell, the more interesting question may be what happens when the boundaries aren't treated as permanent.

An artist's identity doesn't have to arrive fully formed. It can develop through experimentation, mistakes, unexpected influences, changing perspectives, and the simple realization that something that once felt right no longer does. That evolution is not necessarily a lack of direction. Sometimes, it is the direction.

There is also a difference between knowing exactly where you're going and knowing that you don't want someone else deciding where you should go.

That distinction matters.

The modern music industry can make authenticity sound almost like a marketing strategy. Everyone is encouraged to “be yourself,” yet artists are simultaneously surrounded by algorithms, trends, audience expectations, social media pressures, and commercial considerations. The challenge becomes figuring out how much of the outside noise deserves a seat at the table.

For an independent-minded artist, creating music can become an exercise in separating influence from imitation.

Influence is inevitable. Every artist absorbs something from somewhere—a voice, a melody, a performance, a lyric, a record that changed the way they heard music. But influence doesn't have to mean surrendering identity. The goal isn't necessarily to create something that has never existed before. The goal can be to take the things that moved you and transform them into something that could only have come through you.

That is where individuality begins to matter.

Evan Nicole Bell's story can be viewed through that larger idea of artistic ownership. Rather than asking whether an artist fits perfectly into a predetermined category, perhaps the better question is whether the music feels like it belongs to the person creating it.

There is no shortage of artists capable of reproducing a sound.

What is harder to find is an artist willing to develop one.

That process can be uncomfortable. Creating without a formula means accepting that not every decision will be immediately understood. It means being willing to experiment without knowing exactly how the audience will respond. It means recognizing that growth sometimes requires leaving behind something that worked.

And perhaps most importantly, it means understanding that other people's expectations don't necessarily have to become your obligations.

For emerging artists, that can be one of the hardest lessons to learn.

There is an understandable temptation to look around and figure out what is already working. If a particular sound is gaining

INTERVIEW WITH EVAN NICOLE BELL AND GUITAR THRILLS MAGAZINE

Guitar Thrills: Your journey as an artist doesn't seem to fit neatly into one formula. When did you first realize that creating your own path was more important than trying to fit into someone else's expectations?

Evan Nicole Bell: I don’t think that I ever had a particular moment of realization, because creating my own path has always felt like the most natural thing in the world to me. I was an extremely curious child, and I was fortunate to have parents who encouraged me to explore every single idea and interest I had growing up. Because of that, I never felt that there was an expectation to be anyone but myself. That curiosity and the freedom to follow it carried into adulthood and ultimately shaped my artistry and musicianship.

Believe it or not, I never actually set out to have a career in music. My primary artistic medium growing up was the camera, and I was a documentary photographer. I even studied documentary work at the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University, where my work explored the relationship between photographic storytelling, history, and human rights. That experience taught me how to approach other people's stories with care and dignity, and how to connect individual photographs into a larger, more meaningful narrative. When I eventually decided to dedicate myself to music, I brought that same interest in history and storytelling into my musicianship.

I'd been playing acoustic and classical guitar since I was 13, but when I was 21, I picked up an electric guitar and became deeply drawn to the blues. Through immersing myself in that music and studying the masters, I came to understand the blues not just as a musical genre, but as a living record of Black American history. I also began to understand just how deeply its influence runs through so much of the music I'd grown up loving. So when I write music that draws from these foundational American genres, including blues, rock, folk, and soul, I feel I’m participating in a living musical tradition and carrying its story forward in my own way. It's an approach to making music that developed very organically out of my own interests and curiosity, not from anyone telling me what kind of music I should be making.

The bottom line is that when you’re truly in touch with your spirit, your soul, and what you’re meant to do on this earth, it becomes really difficult, impossible honestly, for outside expectations to move you. Creating your own path is the default, not an act of rebellion. I suppose I do a lot of things that are considered unusual. It’s not typical for someone from Gen Z to have an affinity for older genres of music. And while the number of women playing the guitar has been steadily rising over the past couple of decades, it still isn't nearly as common to see a woman leading the band and playing electric guitar as it is to see a man. It’s not typical to be the sole songwriter, performer, producer, and mixing engineer on your own record. But those are all things that are true to who I am, and that’s what matters most. If I couldn’t be true to myself as an artist, making music wouldn’t be worth it.

Guitar Thrills: Music is full of expectations about what an artist should sound like, look like, and even how they should build a career. Have you ever felt pressure to conform, and how did you handle it?

Evan Nicole Bell: Honestly, no, not really. I’m thankful that, in 2026, artists no longer have to depend entirely on traditional gatekeepers to reach an audience and get our music heard. So I feel a great amount of freedom to create and present my work on my own terms.

I think entering music after working in an entirely different artistic medium has given me a nice broad, healthy perspective on “industry.” The art you’re creating matters more than the industry surrounding it. The industry is simply the structure through which the work reaches people. It doesn’t determine what that work has to be or how you do it.

To be honest, though, if I’d been born a couple of decades earlier, I don’t think I would’ve been a musician. I definitely thrive in today’s less restrictive, more artist-centered environment, where it’s possible to pursue a recording career independently. That independence has allowed me to remain hands-on with every part of the process and build a career that reflects who I actually am.

Guitar Thrills: Every artist has influences, but there is a difference between being influenced by someone and trying to become someone else. How have you taken the artists and music that inspire you and turned those influences into something uniquely your own?

Evan Nicole Bell: As people, we are the synthesis of everything we’ve experienced. And so, our art reflects that too. My music is a synthesis of all of the artists and traditions that have inspired me. Some of which I can name, and others that have probably influenced me without me even realizing it.

Guitar Thrills: Sometimes finding your voice requires taking risks and being willing to make mistakes. What is one risk you've taken creatively that taught you something important about yourself as an artist?

Evan Nicole Bell: I took a big risk after my first album came out. I did three things. First, as soon as it came out in January 2025, I went off the grid for like a year and a half. I think I only posted twice on my social media in that time. Once, to promote a song cowritten with G. Love & Special Sauce in honor of Mississippi Hill Country blues legend R.L. Boyce, called “Feel Me Better.” And then I posted once again to honor my friend Todd Snider when he passed away last November. Otherwise, I was off the grid writing my second album.

The second risk I took was deciding to teach myself how to play the drums. And the third was teaching myself how to mix music. I know that sounds insane. Those are two skills that can take years to master, and I knew I didn’t want to wait years to release my second record. I was coming off the momentum of my debut album selling out and videos of my performances going viral. I was receiving invitations to perform that I had to turn down because I was so focused on learning these new skills and making the album. I wanted to build a larger discography before returning to the stage, but it was daunting to wonder whether I was making the wrong decision by stepping away from these opportunities to focus on learning. But I just knew I wouldn’t be able to make the record I envisioned unless I had the skills to do everything myself.

So I did it. Huge risk, because who does that? But I gave myself the time to develop two entirely new skill sets, and I trusted that my vision was worth the risk. And I’m so proud of how the drums and the mix turned out on my new record. It taught me that staying true to yourself and your vision is the most important thing you can do as an artist, and sometimes, committing to your vision and your goals requires going silent for a bit. But it’s all paid off because now I have a record that I love, and I’m excited to get out and play it live for everyone.

Guitar Thrills: The music industry can move quickly, with trends changing almost overnight. How do you stay true to your own artistic identity when there may be pressure to create what is currently popular?

Evan Nicole Bell: Honestly, I don’t feel that pressure at all. Industry norms come and go, but universal truths remain the same. Make good music. Share your music. Be creative. Be good to your supporters. Outside noise can certainly infiltrate if you let it, but I think it remains simple for me because I try to keep music at the center.

I spin Luther Vandross’ record, The Night I Fell in Love, on vinyl almost every night before I go to bed. That record is from 1985. 41 years old. And it still sounds fresh, like it came out yesterday, because it’s simply good music. Beautiful instruments, beautiful vocals, beautiful mix, timeless messages of love. That’s never going to get old.

So, trends come and go. Beauty and truth will always be popular. I don’t want to be on trend. I want to be timeless.

Guitar Thrills: Breaking expectations doesn't necessarily mean being different just for the sake of being different. What are the things you refuse to compromise when it comes to your music and who you are as an artist?

Evan Nicole Bell: I'm certain I'll never use AI to write or produce my music. Everything you hear from me, from the instruments I play to my voice and the words I sing, you can always trust that it's human-made. Art is an expression of our souls. It would be the antithesis of everything I believe in to outsource its creation to a machine.

Guitar Thrills: If you could look ahead several years and see the artist you've become, what would you hope she has never lost along the way—and what would you hope she has completely outgrown?

Evan Nicole Bell: I hope she never loses her love for creating. I hope she remains constantly full of new ideas. I hope she continues to get inspired by the things others might consider mundane. I hope she’s completely outgrown doubting herself or second-guessing her instincts, both artistically and professionally.

No Formula, No Apologies

There is something powerful about an artist who refuses to believe there is only one way forward. For Evan Nicole Bell, creating a path of her own isn't necessarily about rejecting everything that came before her. It's about taking what inspires her, questioning what doesn't, and having the courage to decide what comes next.

The music industry will always have expectations. There will always be trends, comparisons, categories, and people willing to suggest what an artist should become. But those expectations don't have to determine the destination.

The most interesting part of Evan Nicole Bell's journey may ultimately be the fact that it is still being written. There is room for experimentation, evolution, unexpected turns, and even reinvention. And that's what makes an artist's story worth following—not knowing exactly where the road ends, but being willing to keep walking it.

There is no formula for finding your voice.

Sometimes, you must create your own.

And sometimes, the most important thing an artist can say is simply: this is who I am, and I'm still becoming.

PRS Standard 24 Review from Guitar Thrills Magazine Tampa, FL The World of Rock and Blues Magazine.

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