i've been having 'fun' with the ocr software so i scanned in this article which is in the new issue of the subject-mentioned magazine which happened across my path. these sort of magazines leave me feeling empty and ill so i don't advise you to buy it so here's the article. hope it's not too long to post. bye, mark now-wishing-i'd-seen: le tigre AND some snow this winter. just a bit. or a lot. either would do. ------- <fontfamily><param>Courier_New</param><smaller>Record Mart & Buyer March 2000 Pathways of Belle & Sebastian Did Belle & Sebastian happen by accident? The answer is definitely 'sort of'. The inlay of debut album 'Tigermilk' has a little story. "Sebastian wrote all of his best songs in 1995. In fact, most of his best songs have the words 'Nineteen Ninty-five' in them." Sure enough, track one of the album murmurs, "I was puzzled by a dream/stayed with me all day in 1995". Back to the story. "Belle's most recent song is called 'Rag Day'. Sebastian's is called 'The Fox In The Snow'." You have to wait for the second album, but there it is, track five, 'The Fox In The Snow'. 'Rag Day' hasn't appeared yet. Is Belle all right? Does she not want us to hear her songs? You have to be careful, because this is the sort of thing that provokes interest in a band. And that is where the total is greater than the sum of the pads. In pop bands, two and two maim five. It is no accident that all of these little connections can be made between story and song, so we make them. The result is a pure accident Only, the accident is nice. Just like the music. That there are short stories is nice too., because it is, a whole world you are entering, where the songs exist in the stories and on the records. So do the characters. They appear in the story and the records and in the band name. It's all done very carefully, or caringly, but its quite accidental. The origins of the band are the same. They appear so closely knit, so tightly bound with a very carefully thought-out idea of how to deal with being in a band. But they were chosen almost at random. Its all rather like Winnie the Pooh. Just a children's book, but philosophically sound and eminently studyable. In tracing the Pathways of Belle and Sebastian, some cold hard assumptions have to be made, but if you look at all the available material, it reads like this. The band started as a result of Stuart Murdoch's enrolment in a Music Business course at Glasgow University. The course was run by an exmember of The Associates, Alan Rankine. For a final project the course members had to promote a band. Stuart had an ongoing concern in a band occasionally called Rhode Island. He had recorded some tracks and the results were the Rhode Island demos, consisting of 'Dog On Wheels', 'The State I Am In', 'String Bean Jean' and 'Belle & Sebastian'. The song-writing was exquisite and deeply unfashionable. But then a band started as part of a university course is never going to be fashionable. On the other hand, if you think about it (and that's what they're supposed to do at universities) they were bound to become fashionable. The'90s mainstream was so strongly pitched against the popetry of The Smiths it was bound to come around again. One obvious beneficiary was Martin Rossiter of Gene, who gained a little boost with his Morrissey poses. The same goes for Pulp. So, whether he suspected it or not, Stuart Murdoch's songs had commercial potential. The material is planted in a garden with that of the Smiths. In that first clutch of songs the childlike tone pushes through, with talk of a toy dog on wheels and a hefty chunk of school. The world is populated with boys and girls, not men and women. It is reminiscent of early Smiths, with the boyish confusion that left Morrissey asking "Will nature make a man of me yet?" Just like the Manchester band, Stuart Murdoch accepts the state he is in with a smile. "My brother had confessed that he was gay/It took the heat off me for a while". Small blessings. The result of all the hard work was not only the Rhode Island demos, but an album's worth of songs. The last one, 'My Wandering Days Are Over', was finished on New Year's Day 1996. That month, Stuart sat himself in Glasgow's Grosvenor Cafe and recruited a band. Stuart David was already hanging around, writing songs. He could play bass guitar. Isobel Campbell played cello and wrote her own songs, Richard Colburn was a modest-sounding drummer, Chris Geddes could play keyboards, Stevie Jackson could write songs and sing as well. Mick Cook was still around after playing his trumpet on the Rhode Island material, but was not yet made a full member because he was already in a band signed to Sony called 'Hardbody'. Stuart called the band 'Belle & Sebastian' after his song and they went into the studio to record and mix the songs he had written. It took them three long days and nights and they called the result 'Tigermilk'. It was released in April in an edition of 1,000 copies. Half were given away to friends and record companies and radio stations, while the others were sold via mail I order and eventually in the shops. Of all the Belle & Sebastian records, 'Tigermilk' reveals the most influences. One of the more intriguing pieces of folklore revolving around the band is the fact that Stuart Murdoch embarked on what has been represented as a pilgrimage to London to find Lawrence Hayward from '80s indie combo Felt. He didn't find him and returned to Glasgow. Lawrence has performed his own eccentricities over the years. It was his intention to record 10 albums in 10 years with Felt, although this target was never achieved. He later resurfaced to some acclaim with Denim, before disappearing without trace. The trappings of fame were of a similar confusion to Lawrence, who reportedly turned up at Glastonbury festival in a white suit, only to find it ruined. His explanation? "I thought they had cubicles for the stars." Felt were similarly an anonymous collective, with a fluctuating lineup that included Primal Scream's Martin Duffy on the ivories. For a hint of the quirk and attraction of the Felt project check out their 'Train Above The City' LP which is a virtually all-Duffy lounge collection. Lawrence's music with Felt was "the only music that would absorb me 100 percent," according to Stuart Murdoch. Their quietly jazzy style with an understated percussion and Dylanesque vocal informs Belle & Sebastian's output substantially, with emphasis on songs for the Despite the 'unfashionable' songwriting, Belle & Sebastian also tap into a very strong tradition of Glaswegian music. Orange Juice led to The Pastels, then came the Jesus & Mary Chain who split off into last month's Pathways feature Primal Scream and the equally 'difficult' Teenage Fanclub. Following that roughly chronological lineup, it seems that Belle & Sebastian progress naturally whilst lifting a digit off the feedback button. 'You're Just A Baby' and 'I Could Be Dreaming' have a definite feel of coming from the indie height of Orange Juice, with their jangle and saccharin tones. With the debut album finished, Belle & Sebastian sent a copy to Radio One, where it was picked up and played. And that was that. An indication of how busy and productive this time was can be seen in the 1996 schedule. The band was formed in January, released an album in April, wrote another album in June, and recorded a Radio One Session for July with the new material (namely the classics 'Judy and the Dream of Horses', 'The Stars of Track and Field' and 'Like Dylan in the Movies'). Only then did they sign a deal with Jeepster Recordings. Oh, and the new album was recorded and released in November 1996, shortly before even newer material was aired in another Radio One Session (December). In November 1996 the band supported Tindersticks at the Institute of Contemporary Arts. The professed distaste for bandcomparison has in the past been suspended by Stuart for Nottingham's finest export. "Poetry is usually pish, but it can be something special beyond everyday expression. Great words almost always reduce me to tears, because, compared to what's normally going on around you, it's a relief to know that beauty can exist. I remember hearing 'City Sickness' by Tindersticks and feeling elated and very jealous." The connection between the bands is not in sound so much as ideology. Generally over the years the importance of song writing has dimmed while the importance of image has glowed stronger, In music circles you can't move for people marrying failed actresses or rugby-tackling Michael Jackson or pouring water over John Prescott or confessing a Drugs Hell, all in the name of publicity. But the public gasps for a band like the Tindersticks or Belle & Sebastian. They are after all bands without image. Almost literally. The number of existing publicity shots of Belle & Sebastian can be counted on one finger. The Tindersticks are less camera-shy, but have provoked the same needlessly hurt reaction in the music press. "Nobody photographs them in colour any more, it's not worth it," bleated one journalist. But translating a band into words and pictures suddenly becomes deeply unimportant when you see the band actually play. A recent show at the Hammersmith Palais saw the Tindersticks perform an astonishingly assured, mesmerising set, perfectly realised, with perfectly-written songs. It was praise indeed when one review said of Belle & Sebastian "They play like the Tindersticks, and for this they should be worshipped." The successful holding-together of a seven- or eight-piece band dictates that a strong sense of community has to be present, and all the ego of press-handling is irrelevant. Is it any accident that Tindersticks have just produced an authentic soul album in last year's 'Simple Pleasures'? When the soul is strong, the press doesn't matter. The four Tindersticks albums have received consistently excellent reviews and, just like them, Belle & Sebastian have managed to stave off any back-stabbing. You have to say the press was going to be moved by a band that had managed to 'do' 1996 the way Belle & Sebastian did it. Indeed, they were very friendly towards the band, but it soon transpired that the band would not be rolling over. Rather than deliver pictures of themselves, the band preferred to deal in abstracts: a picture of Stuart Murdoch's flatmate for the cover of 'Tigermilk', and occasional compositions such as the bassist crouched over the 'dead' drummer. "The awkward, pretentious bastards," proclaimed the awkward pretentious bastards at the New Musical Express. But despite all of this, Belle & Sebastian managed to make everyone in the press respond in a friendly way. This probably rests as the band's most unlikely achievement to date. It had been tried and rejected before. A case in point is Manchester's James, whose early material is not unlike that of Belle & Sebastian. In 1985 they wanted to be photographed only in silhouette, and shunned the offer of a prominent front cover on the NME's New Year issue. But the hope that they might introduce themselves through music saw the band slapped in labels: 'loony Buddhists' and, familiarly, 'Smiths copycats'. Belle & Sebastian's response to the attention they provoked in their first year is encapsulated in a couple of songs penned by Stevie Jackson for their third album, 'The Boy With The Arab Strap'. Head of the US Sire record label, Seymour Stein (who screwed James over by signing them and then blocking the release of any material) showed an interest, but perhaps wisely the band weren't fussed. The nearapologetic flavour of the incident is captured in the track named after Sire's boss. 'Seymour Stein - sorry I missed you/Have a nice flight home/It's a good day for flying'. More US dealings are chronicled in 'Chickfactor', being the name of a New Yorkbased music magazine run by an 'Indie-Cool Queen'. The lyrics might be seen as a clear enough lament about the distance between the press hound and the superstar as human beings. "Pretty girl says 'Hi ... /What's the worst job you've had?/What do you read?/What's driving you mad?/ ... Are you talking to me?" The misalignment between the band and the big time is something that fuels the accident of Belle & Sebastian. All that can be done is to put across the message and hope it is misconstrued as little as possible. As Chris Geddes once put it, 'I think the deliberate air of evasiveness around us has led to some annoying misrepresentations of what we're like as people. The Sunday Times said it was great to find a band that don't like football. But we do. We're human beings, not sensitivity machines.' The upshot of which is you might just as well I throw a bucket of water over John Prescott as try to explain yourself in print. And then they had to. It was an accident, definitely, but Belle & Sebastian found their unlikely reputation bolstered in the quirk department with the following weird associations. In February 1999 The Sun newspaper (!) accused them of winning a Brit award (!!) for Best Newcomer (!!!) over Pete Waterman's Steps (!!!!) by rigging the votes. It was a storm in a teacup of course, but you can't help thinking that it would have been so much better to have actually rigged the thing. What they ended up with was a Brit (yes, Best Newcomer 1999) and a good yarn. Off they went to record the next album. But that's not it with Belle & Sebastian. They are not a band insofar as there are several different projects going on inside and out. Bassist Stuart David would probably not want to hear you call his band Looper a side project. Or himself a bassist. By all accounts he is last of all a bassist. He is a novelist, having just issued 'Nalda Said' through I.M.P Fiction, and an artist of the highest order when it comes to putting on a Looper live show. It's a multimedia experience, with image projections, TV screens, readings, music and illuminated spectacles going up to make the show. The Looper project also recently linked up with Pulp's Jarvis Cocker and Steve Mackey, who remixed 'Up A Tree Again' for the b-side of last year's single'Who's Afraid of Y2KT Stuart has also produced two books on Belle & Sebastian, the first called 'Ink Polaroids of Belle & Sebastian'and the second 'Little Ink Movies of Belle & Sebastian in New York'. Hart of an 'Ink Polaroid' provides an amusing take on Belle & Sebastian versus the corporate elite. "Chris swings on a tyre swing, and the rest of us are sitting on some rocks laughing at Mark from Jeepster as he tries to sound on his mobile phone. Mark told us later that, before the people from Virgin came to meet us in the playground, they had been saying to our distributors in America, 'Wait till you see. I will make Belle & Sebastian do all the things you and Mark have been unable to make them do.' Meaning set tours, and special releases, and press photographs and things like that. But after they had met up with us in the playground they only said to our other distributors, 'Well...perhaps not."' The Gentle Waves is the name under which cellist Isobel Campbell releases her songs. Their first album features Isobel and Richard Colburn, Chris Geddes, Stevie Jackson, Mick Cooke and Stuart Murdoch. Weighing up the number of readers-to-gossip ratio, I'll take a risk and give the following description: Isobel Campbell's band is to Stuart Murdoch's band what Belle is to Sebastian. Got the general idea? Good, now forget it. The Gentle Waves' album 'The Green Fields of Foreverland...' is innately feminine, working a girl's simple folk songs into breathy Continental styles or cowboy-country or Euro-pop. It took seven days to make, and clocks in at 30 minutes long, every one of them a delight. A second Gentle Waves album was started in October, and would appear to be in production simultaneously with the new Belle & Sebastian offering. Isobel has also played cello on three tracks on The Bathers' debut album 'Pandemonia' for whom Richard Colburn also plays the drums. Chris Geddes has worked with Glasgow's V-Twin, and Stuart Murdoch directed the video for the V-Twin single 'Thank You Baby'. Mick Cooke is also in the Glasgow ska combo The Amphetameanies, and Stuart Murdoch reckons "That's what he's best at." With the other projects occasionally being allowed their own non-Belle & Sebastian breathing space, all this stands up as being a pretty healthy state of affairs. And with the musical output having been stemmed for so long, an explosion is imminent. But a nice explosion. ----------------- Belle & Sebastian releases One of Pete Waterman's complaints about Belle & Sebastian winning the Best Newcomer award at the 1999 Brits was that they were "ineligible", having already released three albums. So it is that the band now find themselves holed up in the studio recording new songs while old material slips out behind their backs. - The publicity generated through all the music industry's tail chasing meant that first album 'Tigermilk' would have to come out again. Radio 1 DJ Zoe Ball claimed to have misplaced one of her two original copies, and her lack of concern over this made some of the Belle & Sebastian fans angry. So in July 1999 the album came out again for a curtain call, this time on glorious CD, and everybody was happy. A more contentious release is the forthcoming box set from Jeepster. It contains the three 1997 Belle & Sebastian E.P.s, 'Dog On Wheels', 'Lazy Line Painter Jane' and '3.. 6.. 9 Seconds of Light' together with bits of new artwork. The primary purpose of their release is to make them available to the European and American markets in advance of the new album, although a limited edition release is also scheduled for the UK. The general feeling in the B&S camp is not to be too interested in the box set release, most especially because the'Dog on Wheels' E.P. is made up of demos recorded when the band was called Rhode Island, by a line-up almost entirely comprised of session musicians or 'others'. Up until now the record's release abroad has been resisted. The song-writing on 'Dog On Wheels' is familiarly excellent with the title track flavoured by the Tindersticks in Hispanic mood. There is also an early version of the gem 'The State I Am In', (later resurfacing on 'Tigermilk') plus the only appearance of the catchy 'Belle & Sebastian'. This latter track is the exception that proves the rule about the band. Its randy drumming settles a thousand miles in the background compared to the gentle pop style of the song, and is quite unlike anything else they have had to offer. The'Lazy Line Painter Jane' EP is interesting for the fact that it contains the first Belle & Sebastian track written by Stuart David, 'A Century of Elvis'. He tells the tale of how he met his wife Kam (coconspirator in Looper), while underneath the band plays the track 'A Century of Fakers', which itself was not released until the next EP'Lazy Line Painter Jane' also sees the band experimenting with production (with the drums again veering off into the distance) and personnel, with Thrum's Monica Queen lending her vocal talents on the title track. The final of the summer E.P.s was'3.. 6.. 9.. Seconds of Light', containing tracks ranging back to Stuart Murdoch's early university efforts. 'Le Pastie de la Bourgeoisie' was, together with 'Rhode Island', one of the names tested out before 'Belle & Sebastian'. That track is fairly strongly Felt-inspired, with a nicely chunky Hammond part opening and a cowboy guitar picking out a quiff riff, before descending into an irresistible catchie-indie ending. As for the future, the fourth album was first pencilled in for last summer, and then for January or February this year. But with 20 songs recorded it all got rather out of hand, and the likely release is now May or June, preceded by the band's first ever prealbum release in the shape of a three-track EP The last EP the band released was 'This is Just a Modern Rock Song', which was not eligible for the charts under the new rules because it contained four tracks. As a result, the chart performance of the new EP is quite unpredictable. The word on the new material is that it sounds like Belle & Sebastian, only perhaps a bit 'shinier'. Isobel Campbell is also working with the band on The Gentle Waves'second album, which is'sounding very good'. </smaller></fontfamily> +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the undead Sinister mailing list +---+ To send to the list mail sinister@missprint.org. To unsubscribe send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to majordomo@missprint.org. WWW: http://www.missprint.org/sinister +-+ "legion of bedroom saddo devotees" "tech-heads and students" +-+ +-+ "the cardie wearing biscuit nibbling belle & sebastian list" +-+ +-+ "sinsietr is a bit freaky" - stuart david, looper +-+ +----------------------------------------------------------------------+