I Could Be Dreaming: the Belle and Sebastian song-by-song, album-by-album thread

It's packed full of brilliant stuff, but it's the performance of Like Dylan in the Movies feat a muted trumpet solo, that does it for me.

 

I played football with them in Hyde Park whilst they were recording Dear Catastrophe Waitress.

We went for lunch afterwards at Wagamamas.

 

Lance, I don't know if you want to include this Stuart Murdoch solo demo "Rhoda" from before Belle And Sebastian was formed, so I'm assuming it pre-dates the Dog On Wheels EP recordings.

Apologies for not mentioning it sooner but I've only just remembered it.

I believe it was considered for inclusion on Tigermilk, along with 2 other unreleased songs "The Disenchanted Pony" and "There's A Place I Want To Be" neither of which I know anything about so I can't date them.

 

I think Hurley’s Having Dreams was also from around them.
I think Rhoda was released in some form at one point (the bootleg version was always poor quality)

 

I'd forgotten that one too, but your mentioning it has reminded me of "London Has Let Me Down", possibly another of the early Stuart demos pre-Belle And Sebastian.

 

that had a fairly rubbish motorcycle noise intro from what I recall. I think it was a very early demo pre B&S.

Rumour has it that Stuart gave away a c90 full of other demos to a local charity shop years ago.

 

I would like to talk about anything that has been officially released.

As far as anything unreleased, I would like to hear them and don’t mind talking about them; links are welcome but I won’t hold them up for discussions of their own.

But any information on any obscurities is always welcome: if any of those songs were released somewhere I will definitely go over them!

Let me know, publicly or via PM, that’s fine. With any big discography there are going to be some obscurities so help is welcome! I generally try to do things chronologically but as I discover things, I’m not averse to going back.

So please let me know about any pre-Tigermilk demos and recordings here, especially if they have been released: in films, on streaming services, digital downloads or physical.

 

My last post was also a reply to this one: regarding Dog On Wheels, while it was released under the title Belle and Sebastian, there was no band when it was recorded: or rather the band was only Stuart Murdoch and Stuart David. Not long after recording they gained a drummer and started calling themselves Rhode Island. This later changed to Belle and Sebastian; this being the title of a short story Murdoch had written. Perhaps also to reflect Isobel Campbell’s involvement in the band.

The others (including Campbell) joined in fairly short order; when Tigermilk was recorded they had only played one gig As a six-piece! It was during the very quick three-day recording of Tigermilk that the band really was forged: there was no band really before the album: they were just associated musician friends of Murdoch. After the album was recorded, they were a band, and thought of themselves as a unit.

Very interesting and unusual beginning.

 

They also didn’t really gig for another two years (‘98 tour)

 

The State I Am In

I love the story being told, the characters in it, Stuart's intimate vocal. I'm not surprised this song was later included on Tigermilk (and as the first track) — it's really quite wonderful. My only quibble when listening to it again (after a few years) was that it might be a minute too long?

4.5/5

 

I came to discover B&S late - maybe 2008-2010. Started with Sinister and eventually got to virtually all of it. I’m not super knowledgeable and haven’t memorized all the songs. But if someone asks me for their best song, it’s probably The State I Am In. 5+

 

Our votes for "The State That I Am In [Beatbox Demo]"

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Average: 4.9167

 

Today's song is "String Bean Jean", writing and production both credited to Belle and Sebastian; but in reality this is a demo tape written and produced by Stuart Murdoch as part of his Beatbox music course in 1995, when his band consisted only of himself and his classmate, bassist Stuart David. The band was still kind of nameless, though they would soon settle on the name Rhode Island...temporarily.

(Alternate YouTube link below.)
Spotify: String Bean Jean

Lyric is HERE: and link also includes streamable video.

Line up:
Stuart Murdoch: vocals, acoustic guitar
Gerry Campbell: lead guitar
Stuart David: bass
David Campbell: drums

ON Wikipedia, it says that Brian Nugent played flute on this song; but I think that's a mistake: I don't hear any flute on this song, and I do hear a flute on the 4th song, which I assume was Brian Nugent.

Other instruments credited on this EP are Mark McWhirter, Michael Angus and David Mackenzie; though it is not known what instruments they played or which songs they played on.

The song's lyric is a slice of daily life from Murdoch who was living with two women and attending the Beatbox music course (aka The School of Rock) in Glasgow at the time: String Bean Jean was the woman who worked at a nearby cafe with whom he would leave the house keys for his roommate who worked all night to pick up.

---
Some more words on this demo tape: It was entered as part of the competition among the other Beatbox musicians, to be judged by a music business course at the same college. The winning entry was to record a 2-song CD single to be released on the small label associated iwth the college, Electric Honey, on a limited run of 1000 copies.

Stuart Murdoch's tape won the competition; but at the time he was only weeks away from moving back to San Francisco, where he thought he might have better career success than in Glasgow.

He refused to release a 2 song CD single; he wanted to release a 7"45.
In the end, rather than backing down, he insisted that if it must be CD that he be allowed to record an entire album.

He convinced the label, including, Alan Rankine (ex-Associates member) to allow him to record an entire album. While only five days of studio time was allotted, the label acquiesced to Stuart's demands, mainly because during the course of the discussion, Alan Rankine realized that Stuart's will and knowledge of what he wanted reminded him of Billy MacKenzie, the leader of the Associates. Although Rankine believed it was impossible to record an album in five days, he also knew from experience that "great artists have a way of getting what they want."

With the news that Stuart Murdoch and his band (now called "Rhode Island") were going to record an record, there was a lot of interest from local musicians; to the core that now constituted Murdoch, bassist Stuart David and drummer Richard Colburn was added guitarist Stevie Jackson a guitarist who was a virtuoso but who eschewed guitar heroics. Jackson was adamant that he wanted to play on the album but he did NOT want to be part of any band, having had his fill of the penurious lifestyle of the indie band . And eventually Chris Geddes on keyboards and Isobel "Bel" Campbell on cello and keyboards joined, and the band eventually changed their name to Belle and Sebastian.

Before the album was recorded the group seems to have played two gigs, and only one as a 6-piece: a house party and Stuart D's and Richard's home (guitars/bass/drums/cello); and a showcase gig at Edinburgh (part of the course) at which a representative from Jeepster records said they wanted them to record their second album for them. So on the strength of this demo alone they were able to release two albums by two different labels.

 

Alternate Youtube link:

 

I like String Bean Jean, even though I wouldn't necessarily think of it as a standout. It fits right in with the early Belle and Sebastian style, lyrically and musically.
I always liked some of the specific lines: "the label on her jeans says seven to eight years old; well, that's pretty small." Even something like, "I left the keys down in the caff", is great. Who else was writing stuff like this?

4/5

 

Hello folks, I'll be following this thread and sporadically joining in. I don't have all the albums but I think I've got all the special ones. I listened to The Life Pursuit for the first time in years the other night. Great record, but also the last one I listened to in any depth. Look forward to the discussion. Will vote occasionally

 

The slice of life lyrics appeal to me: Murdoch has a knack of making the utterly mundane seem beautiful and pristine. The melody is good, just not the world-stopper that the last two songs were. Still the Duane Eddie-style guitar lick and the vocal hooks are strong enough to really draw me in.

There is a bit of a saminess in the rhythm sections on these songs: it's a good sound that David and Campbell make, but it's all the same and but the drums do seem a little obtrusive here; and the overall demo quality of the recording seems more noticeable. In David's book he mentioned that Murdoch's vision really pushed the engineer (who was no professional) to his limits.

Synth solo is interesting, perhasp counter-intuitive color in this song., the type of thing Belle and Sebastian would do again.

4.2/5

 

Fantastic back story, and the track is a 4.5 from me - great guitar!

 

It’s one of those classic early songs which transports me right back to the late 90s. I love those early EPs. I’ve got my Dog on Wheels CD signed by Stuart David (and I think by his wife too).

Trying to think if I’ve ever seen them play it live - I don’t think I have.

(I’m not going to ascribe any scores).

 

I’ve also just remembered Pocketbook Angel, which I think dates to around the same time (and which was never released), plus Lord Anthony which was on DCW.

 

"Rhoda" is apparently unreleased, so I won't hold it up for discussion and rating but I'd like to thank you all for calling my attention to these obscurities!

 

And so obviously of another era. Even if you didn't know it was an earlier song, you'd suspect it. It's almost incongruous on that album.

 

Absolutely agree. Would have made more sense to use it as a b-side like they did with Loneliness of a Middle Distance Runner on Jonathan David. That song had been written some years previously.

 

I will follow this thread and it's surely interesting. I've actually meant to take Belle-albums back on rotation (after brief sort of pause) and revisit their catalogue shortly, but I think for some reason it didn't happen for while (before this thread).
Seems that maybe I somehow had listened to them for too much or my interest was somewhere else, that happened especially with the latest couple albums which I've heard but they didn't quite click with me so instantly (as their other material did in the past).
I have all the albums (studio-albums, Push Barman and Third Eye-comps) on vinyl and cd (I don't have the latest studio-album or How To Solve-comp both of which I listened to from streaming services when they were released).
I might not have time to fully participate (on all songs and such) but I will once in a while try to chime in and comment something, Im looking forward to listening each release.

 

The whole thing had become very polarized - despite the community aspect, there were a lot of personal conflicts which got really nasty. I think David realised this wasn’t getting any better, so he closed it. He runs a forum for cycling now and it’s very successful apparently.

There was a couple of post-Bowlie forums, but I think Anorak is the only one still going and that’s a ghost town these days.