Hello, You know, I thought a lot about this subject while I was making the 10-hour jaunt from Charleston to New York, and I will try to share some of the thoughts that bounced around in my head as I experienced the charm of the highway strip. Regarding Maurice Deebank, Arthur Lee and Steve Cropper, Ben did an excellent job of covering most of what I would have had to say. Much better than I could in fact, since I don't play guitar. I never meant to suggest Stevie should try to emulate Arthur Lee, as I think he did a good job of it in "Expectations." It's just that Belle & Sebastian are a wonderful band that is very capable of flirting with different kinds of songs. You have the bossanova of "Ease Your Feet," the Stereolab-iness of "Sleep the Clock Around" (on the session version anyhow), the McCarthy-ism (hehe) of "Le Pastie de la Bourgeoisie," the Love-liness of "Dog on Wheels" and "Expectations," and numerous others. But for a large part, it seems to me that Stevie's guitar-playing is either played down in such songs (like in "Electronic Renaissance,") or he just plays like he always does. It's not that I think the rest of the members of the band are opposed to this or anything. In Stuart's solo recordings pre-B&S, they seemed to sound pretty much like Stevie's style. But, listening to "String Bean Jean," I just haven't heard a B&S song with a guitar part I liked this much, other than maybe "A Century of Fakers." I might be worried that with a different guitar player they might sound very bad, but I am so sure that I wouldn't mind because Stevie doesn't play at all on DOW and I love it immensely. The playing on it even vaguely reminds me of their current way of it, but only just that little bit janglier at times. And I suppose that's what it all breaks down to. Though I love soul and the guitar playing that comes along with it, I'll always be a sucker for jangly guitars. I still love B&S, but sometimes I think about these sorts of things. Perhaps it's a little too critical, I admit. Also, in case some of you missed it, Stevie once was quoted in a newspaper as saying Steve Cropper was his all-time favorite guitarist. I saved the post somewhere... Anyway, I'm not about to stop listening to B&S, but if they were to break up, I'd be that much less disappointed, knowing that the Stuarts' songs are gorgeous with various other musicians, and indeed Stuart M sounds fine all on his lonesome, so we don't have Moz-like inconsistency laying ahead if such a change ever occurs. /"\_/"\_/"\ Brian Pennington, a.k.a. Mick McMick; Sandcastle Records \ / bp224996@ohiou.edu ICQ#5056758 | | Sandcastle Recs Homepage: http://www.frognet.net/~mick/ | | "I am always wishing to make people | | in the world happy with my smiles." | | -Mr. Friendly +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ 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" +-+ +----------------------------------------------------------------------+