Belle
& Sebastian –
Dear
Catastrophe Waitress
CD Album, 2003, USA
Rough Trade
I love Belle & Sebastian's
graphics, in fact if it was all in a book I would buy it. But their
music leaves me cold except for Stuart Murdoch's side-project “God
Help The Girl” which I think is great. It is what I imagine a
Belle & Sebastian album should sound like. But their actual
albums leaves me cold.
My friend Chris bought me Dear
Catastrophe Waitress and it is
produced by Trevor Horn, who handled the first ABC album, which is a
record I really like. He's known for his big sound, big production,
but it seems for this album he was sitting on one of his hands,
because the sound of the record is very clean sounding and
understated. Which I think serves the songs well, but the material
to me is not that strong or memorable.
I
like their sound, and I can tell that they have good taste in music,
and its sing-along big folk-pop sound on paper sounds great. But the
execution of the record is not what I think it is, and sometimes that
works, but I find it a tad twee without the poison.
But
even on the piles of trash one can find a silver lining, and that is
“Lord Anthony” which has a beautiful arrangement that builds and
builds. Nice tasteful strings and one would not think they would
hear a banjo in this song. So there are surprises here, but not
consistently. The opening track “Step Into My Office Baby” is
cool, and it reminds me of of a combination of 10cc and mid-60's
Beach Boys.
So
in the nutshell, the album is frustrating to me, because there are
places where I think 'ah ha' but it turns into a shrug.
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