Sinister: NME review - not for the nervous.
Ben Ferneyhough
bferneyhough at xxx.uk
Wed Sep 16 15:17:18 BST 1998
Dear all, not seen this posted yet, so thought I'd do the honours.
Enjoy ! Ben.
BELLE & SEBASTIAN
London Shepherd's Bush Empire
Shake awake the spirit of John Lennon
and go tell the Good Lord above the
news - a survey by the Norfolk
Evangelical Christian Fellowship has
revealed that Sir Cliff Richard is a
more famous Christian than The Pope and
Mother Theresa. In fact, were it not
for the spiritual stamina of a little
chappy called Jesus, Sir Clifford would
be the most famous God-loving person on
the planet. Makes you wonder, doesn't
it?
It most certainly does. Rather like
this: 10.15pm on a dank Monday night
and the Belle & Sebastian hordes are
baying for blood. Really. They have
watched, or rather attempted to watch
Elliott Smith, who spent his entire
solo spot sitting down, thus ensuring
that 87 per cent of the crowd were
treated to the toppermost of his bobble
hat. Very Belle & Sebastian. They have
listened to the DJ playing a stack of
'60s tunes which are both unfamiliar,
yet naggingly tuneful, as if they're
all cracking tracks from albums we all
really should own, but don't. Very,
very Belle & Sebastian. And the band
are half-an-hour late onstage. Now boo.
And hiss.
Three thousand Sebastianites cannot be
wrong. For, if nothing else, tonight
will go down in history as the day that
The Spirit Of Sarah Records went
stadium rock; when the blushing indie
schmindie virgin bride threw off her
Field Mice T-shirt, set fire to her
Heavenly bra and marched into the hairy
arena with a guttural growl which
intimated, "Get out of the way, Then
Jericho! There's been a few changes
around here!" And then Belle &
Sebastian come on. And you can't hear
anything. Oh well.
Now, we admire Belle & Sebastian for
their literalism - they released a
single called 'Dog On Wheels' and the
sleeve was a picture of a dog on
wheels, and they sound a bit like Felt
and wear Felt T-shirts. We admire them
for their sublimely individual records
which are graceful and intelligent and,
like, really grown-up, yet deliciously
naive at the same time. And we
particularly admire them for their
cavalier disregard for the tedious
orthodoxy of the music industry, with
its ever-spinning hamster wheel of
interviews and photo sessions and muddy
festivals and mucky exposés. It's just
that throughout Belle & Sebastian's set
we keep thinking, 'God help us if
there's a war'.
Quiet? We'll give you quiet. "Dance,
you lame fuckers!" shouts a man in the
balcony. "Hrrmphff. Must be the heat!"
mumbles Stuart Murdoch, by way of
response. "Turn it up!" shouts a punter
by the bar. "Shut the fuck up!" snarls
the man near the back. Now, this is
getting good. We can tell that Belle &
Sebastian are a teensy-weensy below
full volume by the way in which a
slightly twitched tambourine drowns out
the guitar and a sodding xylophone solo
rings out loud and true, much like
Mister Edge's big axe on Red Rock all
those years ago. Even loitering 20
yards away from the band, it feels like
you're standing in the Doctor Martens
tent at Reading. Watching Red House
Painters on the main stage. "It could
all do with some va-voom," observes a
perplexed passing enthusiast. And he
isn't wrong.
There really is very little point in
taking Belle & Sebastian to task for
being 'mimsy'. This is rather like
berating Black Sabbath for being a bit
'metal', like suggesting that Brian
Molko looks a bit like a 'girl', like
having a go at Jamiroquai for being a
bit of a 'tosser'. It does not matter.
What does matter, however, is the
reverence afforded to this free-flowing
ragbag of Scottish shysters.
The smallest offhand joke brings
knowing guffaws from the masses. A
mid-set raffle (we shit thee not, kids
- first prize: rare-as-a-dodo's-bum
copy of debut album 'Tigermilk')
induces admiring coos. The Belle &
Sebastian mugs on the merchandise stall
cause fans to blurt, "Oh look! A Belle
& Sebastian mug! How sweeeeet!" And
unsurprisingly, the lilting likes of 'A
Century Of Fakers' and 'The Boy With
The Arab Strap' send the anti-moshpit
into the sort of raptures which could
seriously damage your health - quite
literally in one case as Murdoch has to
stop the gig to allow security the
opportunity to rescue one overemotional
sort.
For while Belle & Sebastian undoubtedly
represent the M & S of musical
nourishment (classy and clever, yet not
out of the average shopper's reach) and
their followers were most certainly
born to be mild, there is one hell of a
weird vibe surrounding this very
strange band. Loyalty? Passion?
Earnestness? Not since the heyday of
The Smiths have we witnessed such an
outpouring of obvious, unblemished
delight from an 'indie' audience. But
whereas Morrissey gave it his
ego-ballooning all, revelling in the
love and the limelight, Belle &
Sebastian appear to be content to
shuffle along in the shadows, all
gentle strokes for introspective folks,
giving back as little as they possibly
can. And don't the kids just love it.
Any chance of an encore? Don't be
silly.
Sir Cliffage, almost the globe's most
famous Christian. Belle & Sebastian,
soon to be playing an arena near you.
Makes you wonder, doesn't it?
Simon Williams
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