Outside, a world of rain. It is invisible save from the right angle, but its whoosh and swish rains off the parades, rains in the lucozade, rains off the show, drains out the woe. It is, naturally, beautiful, on the red brick and the green grass, the colourful vinyl and the grey slates. Thought turns, with a bit of luck, to a past. On August 20th, 1998, PJ Miller wrote:
As for a B&S book, I'd like to see one of those "In Their Own Words" books devoted to them.
It is odd that five years later, there has been no book, or buik. I blame JtN, who never sent me his proposal. I think he left it in his other smoking jacket.
What a buffoon I am!
It's an encyclopaedia of Krautrock, dead big and
That's not really true - but it's funny. As Miller's list of rock books goes on, it reminds me of how much diverse !pop! music he likes. probably full of bollocks. It's hard to tell, at a distance, how Miller produces effects like this. Is it any easier, closer up? I'm not telling. I'm starting to think that Miller made up the names of the rock books.
They've got the Deacon Blue book really cheap. Poor old Ricky Ross, Mister Bargain Bucket.
He must be making it up. I mean, there is no Deacon Blue book that I have seen. Miller, if you have bought it since, could you send it to me? A funny thing is that Miller would not now dare to write about Deacon Blue without mentioning the pinefox.
But it was the Huns, they did eat all the pies.
See, that's funny as well - but how does he do it?
T!mothy Hopk!ns, you can't pull the wool over my eyes. At least not for more than a couple of scary seconds.
Here, it is the joke about the wool being scary, because it obscures Miller's vision, that is the source of comedy. The comedy is mild, here. One could reflect that Miller's comic style, excellent then, has not changed much since. (That would, I think, be a good thing.) But how about other writers? Later that day, Tim Hopkins replied:
Here are some more rock book recommendations:
'Unwelcome Home: the strange tale of Peters and Lee' by Mrs Evander Mitchell This details the descent of the once-great 1970s light entertainment duo from
'Post-Hegelian Homesick Blues: The List Song in Postmodernity' by Steffan Hosen Here's what it says on
Just like that - straight in! pop stardom into a seedy life of accountancy and ventriloquism. As a tale of everyday madness, this one is hard to beat. I am missing something here, but the phrase 'everyday madness' reminds me of the time I wrote about two years ago, when Hopkins pointed to a big building and said: 'That's the Stephen Trouss� Institute for Contemporary Madness'. the back: 'Fascinating study (adapted from an acclamed doctoral thesis) which puts the list song at the epicentre of postmodernity, as the apotheosis of one-dimensional fractal culture, referencing, re-referencing and self-referencing out of control, nowhere and everywhere, forever. It demonstrates that, even more than 'machine music' like hip hop, the list song has ruthlessly exposed the modernist myth of the creative subconscious, and locates postmodern creativity in the act of turning on the television, the only purposeful act which remains available to us.' Quite how the author managed to do this much research into list songs without once mentioning Ian Dury's 'Reasons To Be Cheerful Pt 3' is beyond me, but a scintillating read nevertheless. That was good enough to demand reproduction in full. It just demanded it, out of the pink, like that, and I could not say no. I wonder was TH thinking of 'We Didn't Start The Fire', as paradigmatic?
Sarah Records 40: A Celebration
This large format, glossy book tells the amazing tale of how Sarah Records was founded 40 years ago on the tiny Caribbean island of Bristol, and through amazing luck, great judgement and a sense of adventure, has grown and prospered through 40 years and across the whole spectrum of popular music. Guest star forewords are contributed by Eric Clapton, Michael Jackson and Andrew Dean. I don't really understand the joke, here. I am missing some key connection.
The Strange Tale of Litres of Pee: Indiepop Babylon, by Roberto Carro
Amazing expose of the darker side of the indiepop world. You wouldn't believe some of the things those indiepopsters get up to. Read about how Bjork destabilised the molecular structure of the other Sugarcubes' brains, using worrying glares she'd bought from Tricky. Read how the size of Brett Anderson's head is directly proportional to the popularity of his band, and how he now wears hats stolen from Lego figures. Read how Belle And Sebastian's Stevie Jackson was spotted by Dave Lee Roth while filling in on guitar for the BMX Bandits in LA. He accepted a job in Roth's band, but was thrown out after just twenty minutes for throwing a meat pie at Seymour Stein, esteemed head of Sire Records. It missed. Stevie wrote a song about the whole incident. It's a great song. And it's a fantastic book, you should try to get hold of it. That one doesn't work quite so well for me, but the deadpan material on Bjork and Suede is well turned.
Take the book back off the shelf,
That sign-off signals a moment when TH would quote Belle & Sebastian, knowing that everyone knew what he meant. The following month, I would buy the song he was referring to! I like it still. In response to Miller, Hopkins concludes:
I'm not sure what this means, but it's worrying me. Wool? Eyes? Leave me alone.
Welcome Marco#7. I'm going to be annoying and not answer your question. But I propose that 'I brought " THE DELGADO" but i'm not satisfied.' be made the new Sinister sig file quote. Of course, that's only a
There is a little sweet innocence about this. But there is familiarity too. TH can almost be imagined writing something similar today, somewhere. I think that these examples demonstrate what good comic writing Belle & Sebastian were, once, sometimes able to provoke, from some particularly witty people. The same day, Nick Dastoor wrote: personal opinion, but I must admit it's one I hold quite strongly. Oh, dear - that is not N. at his best. It makes me reflect that his sense of humour, timing and style has, or have, improved since.
Nick xxx
He has never given me three kisses. He did not even do it then - I was not on the sinister mailing list. There were about 54 posts to sinister, that day. Brother Mirrorball __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - 50x more storage than other providers! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the 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 +-+ "sinsietr is a bit freaky" - stuart david, looper +-+ +-+ "legion of bedroom saddo devotees" "peculiarly deranged fanbase" +-+ +-+ "pasty-faced vegan geeks... and we LOST!" - NME April 2000 +-+ +-+ "frighteningly named Sinister List organisation" - NME May 2000 +-+ +-+ "sick posse of f**ked in the head psycho-fans" - NME June 2001 +-+ +-+ Nee, nee mun pish, chan pai dee kwa +-+ +-+ Snipp snapp snut, sa var sagan slut! +-+ +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+