Sinister: Albert R. Broccoli presents

[Sarah Garrett Sonner]

Darling Sinister, I'm aiming this straight for your heart,

I’ve been undercover, Rockin’ and Rollin’ up and down the midwest, and took 
note of the following...

Last week when I was in Arkansas, several states south of my CDs, I was 
listening to a tape of TBWTAS and …Sinister on my little headset. I had 
already turned out the lights and couldn’t fall asleep because the house was 
just too damn quiet. I played both albums all the way through, and fell in 
love again, before the headphones got itchy and I took them off and fell 
asleep. It’s been awhile since I was able to listen so intently, and I swear 
I kept hearing things I’ve never noticed before. (Props to the ever-relevant 
Scott who I believe mentioned this audiophilic phenomenon in the context of 
Tigermilk a while back.) A year ago, when I began listening to B&S almost 
constantly, I was spending too much time in airports and on planes and 
couldn’t hear the subtleties over the interference from engine noise and 
screaming children and people. Now I always take that tape on trips. Knowing 
all the words is somehow comforting. Contrary to the obvious, I don’t find 
Seymour Stein to be the most appropriate song, instead Sleep the Clock 
Around, partially for the valium mention. I get so nervous about flying on 
planes that I’m always wishing for in-flight sedatives. And here are those 
lovely people telling me to take one, y’know? And now for the point of this 
paragraph: I have yet to apply my late night headphone-listening as a litmus 
test to the new album. I wonder how the production quality (walls of sound?) 
will seem when heard that way. I like being able to hear fingertips sliding 
up and down a fretboard. Oooh.

On my most recent flight from Dallas to Chicago, the public failed to remark 
upon my colourblind T-shirt. I perversely prefer this T-shirt to the rest of 
the batch because it’s hard to read, but nicely colored and designed. Plus 
since I go to an art school, people have never come up to me and said, “Oh, 
Belle and Sebastian!” They say, “Oh, I do paintings like that!” And then I 
smile and nod.

Nick wrote:
"But before everyone forms a lynch mob, we should see things from both sides 
now: 'Family Twee', you see, had its 'controversial' lyrics penned by Stuart 
himself.  That's all I know."

And then I said, “Yikes!” I must admit I’m puzzled and even somewhat 
alarmed. Controversial, indeed. So I take it Stuart did not write the music 
for this? I’ve been trying to imagine the lyrics sans Isobel and cannot make 
head nor tail of it. I’m so confused--I mean thin--I’m so thin! I also wish 
to join the crowd that wants The Loneliness of a Middle Distance Runner to 
be officially released, but I wonder if I would end up liking the live 
version kinda better, like I do in the case of Winter Wooskie.

Speaking of which, I feel I can hardly comment on the new single. I’ve been 
too busy fighting crime in disguise. And dancing the frug. With Mike Myers. 
But in between the demands of my international lifestyle of mystery, I 
wondered if I’m the only one who misread “Winter Wooskie” as “Winter Wookie” 
and then pictured a shivering Chewbacca in a puffy coat. Of course this 
happened ages ago when I heard of the song before I actually heard it, so 
maybe someone else has already contributed this drippy bit of silliness.

>From the U.S.A. with L.O.V.E.,

Agent Double Oh Sarah

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