Sinister: Tigermilk Reissues

[Hopkins T]

Sorry this is now a little out of date, (and I  wish I'd seen it before
the weekend, duke, or we could have talked this one through over a
couple of scoops) but I feel I need to clarify something regarding the
popness/non-popness dimension of the Tigermilk reissue.
So here goes:
 ----------
From: duke of harringay
To: 'sinister at majordomo.net'
Subject: Re: Sinister: Tigermilk Reissues
Date: 24 October 1997 17:34

>i like the mythical quality of tigermilk remaining
>unavailable (and NO i don't have a copy on vinyl
>either...) , because actually i disagree with tim
>about collectablity not being part of Pop.  I
>think it is...

Hmmm. Now I would have thought that you of all people, sir duke, would
have subscrbed to the more throwaway angle: that pop is about being
cheap and great and (what was it?) throwaway pop tunes which you just
want to keep forever.
Of course I understand the joy of seeking out that great lost tune but I
think that's a different and discrete impulse from the pure pop joy
which I feel when I hear Belle and Sebastian.
And I, of course, also understand the urge to _own_ your pop music, to
build a world-view and a self around it, but I still don't think that
justifies artificailly creating this kind of exclusivity in what I
believe should be a fundamentally democratic medium.



> However... i also think that Tigermilk
>is a great record and deserves to be heard.  Given
>that there's a lot of growing interest in the
>band, i think it should be given a 'real' airing
>to the public

Me too. Oh, me too.


>, and i suspect that despite all the
>comments from the band, it WILL come out, but only
>when they think it's in their best interests for
>it to happen.  It's a juggling act.... keep it
>back long enough to keep people talking and
>hoping, then unleashing it when they feel at a
>peak of publicity, or whatever.  I don;t think it
>will see the light of day until they get a
'>charting' LP and mass interest in the press.
>Then i can see full page ads pushing it as the
>'great lost debut by belle & sebastian' or
>somesuch.  And that's fair enough, because that's
>Pop too.

Well, yes, kind of. Except that one of the (many) things which I cherish
about this band is that they always seemed to want to (and, for once,
seemed to be in the position to) tackle this music industry thing on
their own terms. Now all of a sudden I'm expected to believe that it's
OK to play so strictly by the rules. I'd love to see a little more in
the way of imagina(c)tion going in to how it's to be presented, rather
than falling so quickly into line with the way of thinking which ends up
talking about 'great lost albums'. Which, surely, is classic canonical
rock-speak. I'd like to think that this band, of all bands, find such
language as stomach-turning as I do.

And the point of all of this I will explain in a separate mail, because
this one's long enough already.

Lubricate yours

TimH
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