60 ALBUMS @ 60 : THIS MISSED THE CUT?

Belle and Sebastian- The Boy With The Arab Strap (1998)

I’m playing my newly-acquired copy of the 25th Anniversary reissue of The Boy With The Arab Strap, the third studio album in the career of Belle and Sebastian.  It’s kind of hard to believe that this year saw the release of Late Developers, their 12th album….I don’t think many of us who were listening back in the mid-late 90s would have imagined they’d still be going strong all these years later.

The Boy With The Arab Strap was very much on the longlist for inclusion in the rundown earlier this year.  It was the victim of having to make really tough decisions.  If it had made the cut, I don’t think it would have been at #60….it would have been looked at along with everything else on the list and compared to them.

Anyways, today’s review is an effort to make up for the omission.

I’ll begin by saying that the 25th anniversary reissue is rather lovely to look at.  Where the original had a green coloured sleeve (and it’s a release I only picked up on CD), the reissue has a blue sleeve, which is in keeping with the posters which were illegally plastered all over Glasgow back in ’98. The vinyl is also a lovely shade of light blue.

It’s an album on which the lead vocals weren’t exclusively taken by Stuart Murdoch.  There’s two from Stevie Jackson, one from Isobel Campbell and one from Stuart David….but that still leaves eight for the main man.   It’s an album on which many of the fan’s favourites are included, not least the magnificent, pop-orientated and utterly danceable title track:-

mp3: Belle and Sebastian – The Boy With The Arab Strap

And yup, the title of the song and album was inspired by the Falkirk band.  The two groups had toured together, and rumour has it that Aidan Moffat was slightly besotted by Isobel Campbell, and in due course provided the inspiration for some of the lyric.  Malcolm Middleton, in a later interview, said that came to be annoyed about it all as some folk thought it was some sort of collaboration between the two groups.

I don’t think it’s a perfect album, or indeed a near-perfect album.   The spoken-word effort from Stuart David doesn’t fit in all that well, albeit the outro part of the song over the final minute or so is well worth a listen as a sort of film soundtrack piece of music – but at least with this vinyl version it comes at the start of Side 2 and the needle could be placed in a groove slightly further on (not that I’d dream of doing that!!).  And while one of the Stevie Jackson tracks is more than fine, his second contribution, Chickfactor, is a ballad that has never done anything for me….it’s a reminder that his voice is an acquired taste.

But here’s the one I do like:-

mp3: The Boy With The Arab Strap – Seymour Stein

The tale of how the American mogul tried so hard to get the band to leave Jeepster Records and take the filthy lucre of cash from Sire.

Listening again afresh, I do think the Isobel Campbell song is among my favourite B&S tracks.  I didn’t, however, include it on ICA 165 which now seems a major error on my part

mp3: Belle and Sebastian – Is It Wicked Not To Care?

For the most part, it’s a gentle-paced album, perfect for those long,  lazy and warm summer days, to be listened to while eyes are closed and the rays are caught.  But it doesn’t sound too shabby on a cold but fresh November morning.  I can see this bit of vinyl getting lots of spins….it’s strange that the CD hasn’t been played in years….but then again, very few of them are these days.

Talking a moment or two ago about cold…..I’m heading off later today to somewhere I expect to be chilly. It’ll be my first ever trip to Oslo, the capital city of Norway, and I’m quite excited about it.

Only downer is that it is very much a straight there and straight back effort that won’t leave me much time for sightseeing.  It’s also probable that I’ll land just as the dusk comes in, and my journey back out to the airport tomorrow will be so early that the sun won’t have fully risen.

But it’ll have all been worth it, I’m sure, as the reason for the trip is to see Arab Strap play live (well, Aidan and Malcolm as  a duo), performing the album Philophobia, which was #21 in the 60@60 list.

They have been out on the road for a fair bit of this year, and things are closed off next month with a series of gigs in Scotland, all of which coincide with me being away on holiday.   So, Norway it is.  The flight and hotel were very reasonable, and I’ve vowed that I’ll stay off the drink to save money!

Oh, and I’m going in solo for this one…it should be quite the adventure!

JC