And who is this 'middlingly famous' Scottish pop singer? Any hunches? Nick xx Belle who? . . . they won a Brit Award when no one had heard of them Belle And Sebastian may not court fame, but they?ve sure found success. By Caroline Sullivan Do you want to know how much I hate them? Even their name raises my blood pressure,? says a middlingly famous pop singer of fellow Scots Belle And Sebastian. What seems to be an inordinate amount of spleen directed at one inoffensive rock band is actually par for the course. Since emerging in 1996, the Glaswegian octet have inspired more fuming than almost any other group, all due to their so-called ?wussiness?. There?s a good deal of evidence for the prosecution. The six men and two women (none of whom is called Belle or Sebastian) were last in the queue when God handed was handing out the rock?n?roll swagger, and were redirected instead to Wistful via, with an interim stop at Puny Physiques on the way. Songwriter Stuart Murdoch refuses to do interviews, while the others refuse to be photographed (the cover of their debut album, Tigermilk, featured a snap of Murdoch?s girlfriend). And their fans are so shy they mostly converse on the internet, occasionally mustering the courage to go to events with names like like 200 Troubled Teenagers. Guilty as charged, wuss-wise, and even they admit it. The obverse, though, is that it takes shimmeringly unusual music to provoke the reaction they do. Tigermilk, which is re-released this week ? original 1996 copies, of which only 1,000 exist, change hands for up to £800 ? is a good place to begin. Songs contain not lyrics but paragraphs, read/sung by Stuart Murdoch. A track might begin, ?My brother had confessed he was gay/It took the heat off me for a while/ He stood up with a sailor friend/ Made it known on my sister?s wedding day.? Cellos and trumpets have higher status than guitars, and the tempo is slow enough for bedroom to encourage brooding. Those who join their insular club take out membership for life ? and on February 16, fans rose in a show of strength. That night, the meek inherited the earth ? or at least the Brit Award for best newcomer, as Belle And Sebastian won 9,500 votes in a phone and internet poll. Producer Pete Waterman, who?d expected his charges Steps to win, called the result a fix and demanded a recount. A member of Steps voiced the question in the minds of most of the nation: ?Who are Belle And Sebastian?? A bad night for robopop, but a good one for music. Belle And Sebastian hadn?t expected to win either, so only the drummer and trumpet player had been sent to the ceremony. Murdoch, who never attends such events, was busy that night anyway. He works as a church-hall janitor, and spent Brits night clearing up after the local flamenco club. ?We?d heard rumours throughout the day that it was us, but didn?t take it seriously,? recalls Richard Colburn, who played semi-professional snooker before joining as drummer. ?The camera crew suddenly zoomed off to another table just as they were about to announce it, so we thought it was Billie or Steps ? and then they zoomed back to us. Rabbit-in-the-headlights time.? Next morning, drummer Richard Colburn and trumpeter Mick Cooke found themselves dazedly running a dazed lap of honour on The Big Breakfast as other stars denounced their win. ?Another Level said we cheated, but what really bothered me was when Cerys from Catatonia said, ?If Belle And Sebastian are best newcomers, I?m Robbie Williams?. When you consider that a year ago she was in the same boat as us...? sighs Cooke, who looks far too young to be in this Glasgow pub, which may be why he?s restricting himself to orange juice. He, Colburn and guitarist Stevie Jackson are the Belle?s lad faction, inasmuch as such a thing can be said to exist. The distinction comes from the fact that they?re the only ones willing to do interviews, although they vet these carefully. Colburn, who flat-shares with Murdoch in the church hall, has taken the afternoon off setting up tables for tonight?s bridge session (?It?s very popular?) to be here. Cellist Isobel Campbell and bassist Stuart David, who would have more to gain by being interviewed (Campbell has a solo band called The Gentle Waves, David a project called Looper), have elected to be absent, as have violinist Sarah Martin and keyboardist Chris Geddes. They begin, rather surprisingly, by disputing the idea that their fans are bashful underachievers who spend their lives on the net (although the fact that their website receives around 50,000 hits a week does support this theory). ?It?s too easy to put a label on us. We get all sorts, agewise and professionwise. I see quite good-looking people who?ve got girlfriends,? maintains Colburn, ploughing through a bacon sandwich in an indeniably masculine manner. ?I don?t look out and see a bunch of geeky, speccy shy people.? ?They?re on stage,? quips Cooke. ?We?re not responsible for a lot of things that go on on our behalf.? This is a reference to 200 Troubled Teenagers, an event in London in February that saw gaggles of foot-scuffling girls and boys gather to whisper about favourite tracks from the Belles? three albums (the others are If You?re Feeling Sinister and The Boy with the Arab Strap, both deservedly acclaimed). It was the band, however, who were behind the Bowlie Weekender in April: three days of holiday-camp fun starring themselves and other limelight-rejecting bands. ?But we don?t reject the limelight,? argues Jackson, who?s quiet enough to be one of his own fans, but way too tall. ?It?s not a predetermined policy to be elusive, it?s just the nature of the beast. I?d love to have a hit single. I?d love to play Top of the Pops! That?s our next goal. If you?re going to do it, you might as well let people hear it.? In which case, perhaps you should have signed with American music bigwig Seymour Stein when he offered, and not refused support slots for on Radiohead and Pulp tours. Jackson shakes his head. ?That was because there?s eight people in the group and a very complex sound. It?s taken all sorts of public humiliation and ineptitude to get almost professional, and we need very long soundchecks, sometimes hours. So we can?t do supports, because we need control, and anyway, we only want to play to people who are there to see us. We?ve just turned down the Charlatans.? There?s no evidence of ineptitude on Tigermilk, which they?ve decided to re-release because ?the price [of original copies] was going a bit mad?(popster Stephen Duffy supposedly owns 10 copies). They evince a quiet pride in the record, which was recorded in five days as part of a music-business college course. Now held up as the the gold standard of indie rock, it was almost totally overlooked back in ?96, attracting just one (favourable) review. ?It?s stood up,? Colburn declares. ?I still enjoy listening to it. We couldn?t have done it any better. Even the mistakes become defining.? Belle And Sebastian are now feeling their way toward a their fourth album. A It?s a tortuous process, because, typically, they insist that every decision be unanimous. Top of the Pops notwithstanding, they will undoubtedly continue to dodge the spotlight and irritate those who can?t understand how a band could turn down the bright lights for insularity and church halls. Real success ? which is predicted for the next album ? may drive them even further underground, where even more delicate shoots will take root. Tigermilk is reviewed on page 18 (except it isn't, at least not in the edition that I've got. Unless they are confusing Belle & Sebastian with Hefner) +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the reborn Sinister mailing list +---+ To send to the list mail "sinister@majordomo.net". To unsubscribe send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to "majordomo@majordomo.net". WWW: http://www.majordomo.net/sinister +-+ "legion of bedroom saddo devotees" "tech-heads and students" +-+ +-+ "the cardie wearing biscuit nibbling belle & sebastian list" +-+ +-+ "jelly-filled danishes" +-+ +----------------------------------------------------------------------+