Belle and Sebastian for People Who Don’t Like Belle and Sebastian

Even among those with a strong tolerance for twee, their exists a certain contingent of folk with steely and/or flinty hearts who steadfastly deny the abundant charms of Belle and Sebastian. To those of you not bewitched by the sweet/sly dialectic of Stuart Murdoch’s songs,* or the increasing tightness of the band itself (somehow these ragamuffins just fucking lock in together – at each of the shows I’ve been to, the initial song starts off weak, as if the band hadn’t played together in months, but as soon as the first chorus hits everything becomes fucking beautiful. With the elimination of distraction Isobel Campbell, who seemed only to pout and kibitz onstage, perhaps the band will be even more tight at this week’s show in Prospect Park, which is BTW far too expensive, and it better not fucking rain, dude). An all-too-common sentiment expressed by these tough, tough kids is that “I don’t like Belle and Sebastian, but I like stuff that sounds like Belle and Sebastian.” Well, I have two things for these people: A clue, and some songs by bands that are sort of reminiscent of Belle and Sebastian, but, you know different. I guess they’re similar in an Amazon.com “if you like this, try this” way, which we all know uses the most advanced AI the military industrial complex has ever devised. Think about it. What would be more important than to develop an easy way to convince people to consume more and more of what they already have? But before I start sketching an ASCII version of the infamous GSY!BE (is that punctuated correctly?) record company/military-industrial complex chart (which I think I can improve to implicate Tommy Mottola, as the prime mover behind the current Iraq thing, as a ploy to boost sales of Thalia, but that will wait), let me offer you two bands, one American, one British.

The Americans, The Mendoza Line, are much loved by me for their ruling aesthetic of dogged failure. I finally witnessed them in action a few weeks back, opening for the borecore (well, their live show, reputably – I didn’t stick around for it, though) Luna at Maxwell’s. The 6 person strong band, a few of them more drunk than the others, gamely plowed through a set of songs from their last two albums, as well as a great cover of Arab Strap’s “Packs of Three,” which I tried in vain to find to post here. What you’re getting then is A Damn Good Disguise, which is a damn good song where one of the 3 ML songwriters, Tim Bracy, is at his most bitter and dylanesque. And he really fucking sounds like Dylan when plastered, as he was at the Maxwell’s show. “A Damn Good Disguise” sounds like Belle and Sebastian with less lisping and more pedal steel, which is a good thing. Who the hell doesn’t like pedal steel? This may be, as I wrote on my blog, to which I will not link because it is struggling to be reborn into something less insufferable at the moment, a hootenanny, though I am, as is well known, not an expert at the hootenanical. Nor any other songform, for that matter.

Anyway, check out this entry from The American Book Congress, a collaborative blog from some of the band members, wherein they attempt to write the liner notes to their forthcoming CD. And NYC residents, please note the band will be performing at Mercury Lounge this Friday, August 15, and I may or may not be attending, depending on what my palmist has to tell me.

The other band is not a particular favorite of mine, but they often get lumped in with B&S (finally got tired of typing that), and so I will note them here. I just heard this song yesterday for the first time, so I’m not quite sure how it will stand up, but the title track from The Clientele’s “The Violet Hour” is quite stunning, better even than the standout from their previous material (collected on “Suburban Light”), a song about everyone’s favorite boxer, “Joseph Cornell.” Unfortunately, you’ll have to seek it out yourself. The Violet Hour sounds kind of Californian folk-psych to me, even though these guys are from London. It’s a fabulously put together number, and has a lax, romantic vibe that just makes me want to smoke a cigarette in silence with you at 2 am. Yes, you! The cute one, over there!

(The Clientele are playing at the Bowery Ballroom September 11th, I believe, with Damon and Naomi)

In any case, thank you Matthew for letting me invade your blog, and I thank all of you very sophisticated and no doubt well-groomed and very tall, to boot, individuals, for putting up with my unwarranted love for middling indie rock bands. Let they, with their soft sounds and intelligent lyrics, ease you into the night, or mid-afternoon, or whatever time you happen to hear these songs.

* Yeah, he shouldn’t let anyone else sing or write songs, I know.