Sinister: they say that when something happens, you should talk about it

[Ian Moore]

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



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