Tuesday 12 October 2010
I didn’t see it coming
If Belle and Sebastian‘s early recordings were the asthmatic, pock-marked, four-eyed no-name kid sitting in the back of your high school biology class, then The Life Pursuit was the contact-wearing, five-times-a-week-gym-trained, entrepreneurial millionaire that waltzes into your 10-year reunion that makes every one’s head spin when they realize that these two extremes are the same person. The trajectory of development is evident, but the evolution has been slow and controlled. Throughout their lengthy career, there’s never been a whiff of reinvention, or a dramatic shift in sound or style. But when you trace the arch of where they’ve come from (1996′s school project Tigermilk) to where they are now (14 years, 8 EPs and 8 studio albums later), the transformation is enviable.
That being said, the blandly-titled Belle & Sebastian Write About Love doesn’t move the band forward as far as one might hope. In the wake of the God Help the Girl project, whose rotating door of guest vocalists necessitated Stuart Murdoch’s taking a back seat on singing duties, he seems even less interested in being a singer in a rock and roll band now. Actress Carey Mulligan and MOR-approved chanteuse Norah Jones figure prominently on “Write About Love” and “Little Lou, Ugly Jack, Prophet John” receptively, leaving me scratching my head trying to make sense of it all. On God Help the Girl, Murdoch’s proved he can write for others just as effectively as he can write for himself, but I just assumed that was the purpose of the project, as an outlet for creativity and collaboration that didn’t exist in Belle and Sebastian itself. The writing was on the wall, though, if I cared to read it. Most (if not all) of Belle and Sebastian was involved in God Help the Girl, so perhaps it was just a dry run for this record.
Jones presence don’t actually deter from the record. “Little Lou, Ugly Jack, Prophet John” is one of it’s finer moments, but Mulligan’s turn on the title track could just of easily been handled by band member Sarah Martin, who doesn’t often get the chance to flex her vocal muscles on a track this poppy (Martin and Murdoch do do a lovely job on the album opener “I Didn’t See It Coming”, though so that kind of makes up for it).
And that brings me to another point about …Write About Love that saddens me: where have all the great Stevie Jackson songs gone? His contributions have always been a highlight of any new Belle and Sebastian record, but all we get here is “I’m Not Living In The Real World” (“The Telephone Song” and “If I Can’t Help Myself”–both Jackson credited compositions, were part of the band’s promo TV television program but didn’t make the final cut of the record). That’s not to say that there’s a lack of good songwriting on the disc, but …Write About Love isn’t really a showcase for how great the band can be. “Read The Blessed Pages” is “I Can See The Future”, both relegated to the album’s back are both just cushion for the pushin’ (i.e. record padding fluff), but even the strong opening tracks lack the glimmer of real genius that’s in abundance on The Life Pursuit. I know I know, I can’t expect them to follow up their career high with yet another masterpiece, but by the time “Sunday’s Pretty Icons” signals the record’s close, you’d hope that the impulse would be to listen to it again, rather than go back a release and listen to their last record instead.
“I Want the World to Stop” is the one …Write About Love song that earns the label of “classic Belle and Sebastian”. It’s soul-filled, funky bass and preternatural poppy groove sits head and shoulders above its peers here. If only the rest of the album had benefited from its tension, it’s gusto, and style, this might have been an altogether different sounding review.
…Write About Love is still that same geek-turned-god from school, but his temples have grayed around the edges and, his midsection’s rounded where it was once chiseled. He’s not gone to seed yet, but if nothing’s done soon, you can see where he’s headed in the not-too-distant future. there’s time to get back into condition before the 15th reunion, though. Belle and Sebastian have it in them to be fighting fit again, they just need to get off the couch and get in the ring again.
Belle & Sebastian Write About Love is out on Matador Records today (October 12, 2010).
MP3: Belle and Sebastian “I Want the World to Stop”
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This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 12th, 2010 at 8:30 am and is filed under MP3, QBiM SPiNS. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.
