Hi all, (let's try this again... some Tory voting formatting sneaked into the mail when I tried to send it previously) So yeah, reporting back. Sorry, I've been a bit distracted. You know how it is. Anyway, you know that Belle & Sebastian? They played a gig here in Dublin relatively recently, just before their album came out. We lived the dream, not merely going to it, but meeting beforehand with some other B&S fans (including Wookie or Seamus or whatever he calls himself from here) for a walk in the Botanic Gardens, later repairing to a pubbe for some booze. The Botanic Gardens were great crack... we got to stroll around the green houses and then outside we saw the poison garden and the world’s tartiest squirrels. We were also amused by a sign in the greenhouse beside the venus flytraps, warning that triggering the traps for amusement could result in death. Down at the concert we arrived to find that support band The Brakes were already onstage. I found myself thinking that their riffy guitary sounds were just what I needed in my several beers in state, but others thought that they (the Brakes, not the beers) were a bit on the lame side. They are meant to feature some of British Sea Power, a band that in retrospect I reckon were not up to that much. B&S themselves played a stormer… I had become a bit sick of seeing them live, after seeing them four times in a year once. Well, absence makes the heart grow fonder, and the gap had left me much better able to appreciate their live skills and rapport with each other and their audience. They played a fair amount of songs I did not then recognise, presumably from the new album. One particularly epic unfamiliar track was introduced to me as ‘Your Cover’s Blown’… apparently it was a b- side to ‘Wrapped Up In Books’, a single from the last album. Looks like I may have to start collecting B&S singles again. I was also amused to learn that “Fold Your Hands Child, You Walk Like A Peasant” is now considered an old Belle & Sebastian album. They did however play more than no genuinely old songs, and hearing ‘Electronic Renaissance’ live means that I can now die in peace. Stuart didn't break his guitar this time. Anyway, it was all a bag of fun, and in retrospect I wished I hadn't pegged up to Belfast for the Tuesday gig. But you can't live your life on rewind, so perhaps it was for the best that I didn't try to re-create the magic of the time I went up a couple of years back to see B&S in the Nelson Mandela hall, in the company of a great many Irish Sini-Bowlie types who seem to have largely disappeared since then (bar the aforementioned Seamus/Wookie and yer man Psi). Great days, Gay, great days, wheh wheh wheh. Um yeah, whatever. I'll be back shortly with some comments on THE NEW ALBUM. DV +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ 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! +-+ +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+