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| https://postpunkmonk.com/2015/08/14/three-british-bands-that-i-liked-in-the-90s-1-saint-etienne/ |
A Sense of Doubt blog post #2660 - Words on Music: Saint Etienne on The Joys of Pop
Just this share today.
It's a good day when I find things like this.
https://thequietus.com/articles/10846-saint-etienne-interview
Words On Music: Saint Etienne On The Joys Of Pop
Aug Stone , December 3rd, 2012 10:07
The charming London trio discuss the ingredients to pop’s magic potion with Aug Stone
For the pop music fan, i.e. someone who demands more from the whole experience than just an album's worth of songs every year or so, Saint Etienne are a dream come true. And the pop world they've conjured up over the past 20+ years contains all the magic of dreams, with new vistas continuously opening to give those enchanted ever more to explore.
The band are able to weave such wonders because they themselves are fans, and thus know all the delights to be had. Just recently they held a contest to win a copy of singer Sarah Cracknell's extremely rare 1987 'Love Is All You Need' single. Over the years there have been plenty of obscurities to track down – the French 'Lover Plays The Bass' single, Cola Boy, fanclub records, the releases on their Caff and Icerink labels, as well as the songs they've written for other people, like the eight tracks on Absolute Shampoo. They've made sure their sleeves look good, a crucial component in creating a world, expanding this into films in order to share with us unfamiliar aspects of London, the subject always present in the heart of their work. Sarah, Bob Stanley, and Pete Wiggs introduce us to their own favourite bands and songs via opening slots and compilation cds. Then they host special events with their own exclusive giveaways.
And of course, there's the holiday EPs - Valentine's Day and Christmas. Especially Christmas. December's festivities have always been dear to Saint Etienne, with Bob indeed being born on Christmas Day, and the band revel in throwing holiday parties or playing gigs to celebrate the season. They will continue to do so in York, Edinburgh, Manchester, Brighton, and London from December 10-14th. A fine way to finish out the year that saw them release eighth studio album Words And Music By Saint Etienne: a testament to the magic of music, of how special and important, how wonderful, it is to have in our lives.
The new album is largely about your love of music. What were you listening to while you were making it?
Bob Stanley: We weren't listening to anything as a group particularly, were we? Like we quite often do.
Pete Wiggs: Nothing that necessarily inspired or influenced the sound of the record. It's not like we suddenly discovered pop music [all laugh].
BS: I think the sound of it largely came from all working together at Xenomania, about three years ago now. That kind of splintered and everybody we worked with there, apart from Brian Higgins, left and went independent. Nick Coler, Tim Powell, Tim Larcombe. Even though they'd gone independent we thought 'well, we always got on with each other'. It was quite weird because we ended up writing loads, which is how the place works, where they're writing loads of songs that [mock indignant] no one ever sang. We got one song ('Save The Lies') on a Gabriella Cilmi album. But you're in there writing loads of songs that never come out. So it was nice to actually be in control of it, cause you're writing songs with these people who keep them there.
Sarah Cracknell: Things got dismissed that were actually really good. 'No, no, we're not using that.' [Disbelieving voice] 'But it's really good!'
BS: 'No, lyric's weak. Weak lyric.'
PW: Yeah, so we wanted to put out our own… weak lyrics [laughter].
The new album is still very much you, and very much pop, but it's strikingly different to me, in a way I can't quite put my finger on. Do you get a sense of that? Were you consciously trying to do something different?
SC: Do you think it's just cause we've got more people involved, externally?
PW: We've employed a bit more self quality control, to some extent.
BS: Yeah. We also had a lot of time to write it. Make sure it was how we wanted it. There's so many leftover songs, we're not sure what to do with them all.
PW: And I think the kind of concept is much more inclusive. Easy for anyone to get a handle on.
SC: Yes, it's something that [adopts serious voice] 'everybody can relate to'. There's an emotive theme running through. So it touches people 'deep inside', touches people's heartstrings. It's about songs that mean something to you, and everyone seems to have those special songs. We like melancholy and we like that juxtaposition where the music is upbeat but the lyrics are more downbeat or more melancholy. I think we always use those similar tools.
I really love the album title, Words And Music By Saint Etienne. What do you think are some of the other all-time great album titles?
SC: I like Let The Snakes Crinkle Their Heads To Death [Felt's 1986 nineteen-minute instrumental album].
BS: I was gonna say that! [laughter]
SC: Got in there first! They don't come much more bizarre than that.
My favourite has always been Everybody Wants To Shag The Teardrop Explodes.
[all laugh]
PW: Yeah, that's brilliant. Fear Of A Black Planet, You Can't Hide Your Love Forever, Reggae Owes Me Money, that's a great one.
BS: I like Swaddling Songs, the Mellow Candle album. In 2000/2001 we did a folk club called Club Swaddling Songs, so that springs to mind. There must be more obvious ones but that's a nice description of the music.
I thought the Spiritualized album, Songs in A & E, was very apt for them.
BS: Yeah, yeah. Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space is a really good name as well. I'm not much of a fan, but cracking titles and artwork. I'm trying to think of ones where I don't actually like the record, that's a good one. Or where you want to hear the record because the title sounds intriguing. Snakes Crinkle Their Heads To Death, that's pretty great.
PW: What's Wrong With This Picture? [Andrew Gold] is a funny one, isn't it? Not a very good name.
BS: Best artwork, How Dare You? [10cc], really good artwork [laughs]. I've found some of my favourite records have got terrible covers. Well, not terrible but Pet Sounds is, apart from the font, the most ridiculous picture of all-time. Forever Changes, pretty terrible.
PW: Unknown Pleasures isn't a very good name for a record, but great cover.
You talk about how music was intrinsically tied to growing up, how important it was. Now that you have kids yourselves, do you see that in them? What do you play them?
SC: Yeah, though they're still quite young. They do that thing that kids do, they switch from one to another, but they do get really obsessed about certain songs or a certain band. Really obsessed, literally, you can hear it going like 50 times. You think, 'Oh my god!' Mine are constantly pretending they're in a band, there's a lot of that going on. I'm slightly worried.
PW: Mine are suddenly getting more into it, which is nice to see. It's sort of tragic though, 'cause a lot of it is our music. [laughs] I gave them the Words And Music boxset and Harvey went [adopts serious child voice] 'This is a family heirloom'. It was brilliant to see him 'cause he was opening it really carefully and he put the badge on and was going 'I'm gonna treasure this forever'. And they started getting into the remixes as well, and singing the words and things. They've both got different favourites. It's nice to see that they get excited. They pick out unusual lyrics and they notice things about music that sometimes you miss. They'll highlight elements of a song and you'll go 'oh yeah, I never thought of that before'. It's good to see how their brains work.
I remember vividly as a child, my mum playing her girl group 45s and Beatles records, and sitting there fascinated, making up stories in my head of what it all meant.
PW: Same here, I got really into and latched onto ones I could make a story out of, or if there was an obvious story. Even if it was something daft. Novelty records, like Benny Hill's 'Ernie' [Sarah laughs]. It's so graphic, even as a child you latch onto that. And 'Johnny Remember Me' [John Leyton, Joe Meek's first #1 as producer], cause there's a story and it's got a sort of Western feel.
SC: And I remember with both of those, they sounded quite tragic. There was something dramatic going on. They sounded grown up.
PW: Yeah, yeah, yeah. 'The Leader Of The Pack'. Harvey plays that on a loop, because it's got everything, everything you need.
BS: Yeah, 'Leader Of The Pack' was really serious. I've never shaken it out of my head. People say 'oh, it's such a camp record.' What?! No, it isn't. What are you going on about?
SC: They say it sounds important to a child.
PW: But you still have that when you hear it now. Even though you know it's camp, it still touches a nerve.
BS: She sings it so sincerely as well.
So what was that first single you bought at "Woolies in Redhill"?
SC: 'Rock On' by David Essex.
BS: Mine was 'Amateur Hour' by Sparks. Mainly because I wanted 'This Town Ain't Big Enough For Both Of Us' but it'd gone out of the chart by then. [laughs] Obviously, I was young and didn't realize you could order something. It was like it was gone forever so I got the next single. Which I still liked.
PW: Mine was 'Winner Takes It All' by ABBA. Doom-laden. Doom pop.
You mention the synthesiser a couple of times on the album by name. Do you remember your first time hearing a synthesiser and what you felt?
BS: Yeah, it definitely sounded important. Well, we say that in the bloody lyrics don't we? [on 'Over The Border'] It was Chicory Tip. 'Son Of My Father', obviously. 'Popcorn' [Hot Butter] must've been around the same time, definitely the same year. And you just started thinking, you had no concept of electronic music. I remember on Tomorrow's World or other TV programs, they'd often have synthesisers and some presenter going 'This is how all music will be made in the future.' They'd always say that, so you'd just assume it was true.
SC: Someone with white gloves in a lab coat. [laughs]
PW: I'd hear things on TV, like Blake 7 and Dr. Who. It had that eeriness to it. And mystery.
BS: I bought a Korg MS-10, beginning of 1981. I saved up money from working down Surrey Street Market. It was 200 quid. And Juan Atkins did as well.
My favourite bit on the new record is that "Oo-oo-oo-oo" backing vocal in 'Tonight'. I always love little bits like that in songs that really move you, make you go 'YES!' Other examples for me are at 2:38 in New Order's 'Age Of Consent' when Bernard starts freaking out on the guitar, and the coming back in from the middle 8 in Duran Duran's 'Last Chance On The Stairway', the "don't even know what you're drinking" part. Do you have any favourite bits like that in songs?
PW: Yeah, I know what you mean, the little bits of songs! There's some I used to always go on about, sometimes it's wrongly played or just something that jumps out. You remember that, it goes around your head. There's one in The La's 'There She Goes', it goes to a minor chord. I always used to love that bit. There's millions. Silly things, like on Pet Sounds, the car horn sound...
BS: On 'You Still Believe In Me', yeah. Nick Dewey, who now runs Glastonbury, pointed out that on 'Mouldy Old Dough' [Lieutenant Pigeon], the most unlikely song to have this really emotional bit in it, there's a drum roll that comes out of nowhere in a really odd part of the song. He said it always made him well up. When you get something like that and you can't explain why it does that, it's pretty special.
SC: That was one of the songs that the kids picked up on the radio the other day. They started off going 'what's this old man singing?' and by the end of it they were going 'I really like that one'. [laughs]
PW: It's amazing how often I get the guitar solo from 'Novelty' by Joy Division in my head, first solo I ever liked. Ian Hunter saying "Made it" on 'Roll Away The Stone'. Big Star's Third is full of slightly wrong sounding moments that add to the sense of unhinged melancholy. Like the two picked acoustic guitar notes that leap out at you after Alex Chilton's first few words on 'Kangaroo'.
SC: One of my favourite 'YES' moments in a song is when Alicia Keys comes in with the chorus just after the "Yeah, yeah's" on 'Empire State Of Mind' - "In New York..." So many people have danced around my kitchen singing that, quite badly, until the early hours!
I always say that there's something about a really great pop song that's akin to the feeling you have after you've first kissed someone you really fancy.
SC: Yeah, absolutely.
What do you think is inherent in all great pop music? Or any similar comparisons?
PW: Say you hear something on the radio or in the background that you don't know, there's that reaching for something, or asking someone what it is. Some songs you can just have in the background and it'll pass, but other ones are like 'what the hell's that?' That often happens, sometimes even if you know it, something leaps out and you go 'Oh, what's that? I remember that!' And other times it just strikes you, music, doesn't it? There's something about it that you can't put your finger on. It'll cause an emotion in you that is either happy or sad or reminds you of something. Or just makes you wanna go 'I wanna hear that again!' It still happens, which is nice. Now, I leap for the phone. Google or Shazam it.
BS: I used Shazam when I heard 'OMG' by Usher. I thought it was the most amazing thing I'd ever heard. Well, not the most amazing thing I'd ever heard, that would be ridiculous. But yeah, I thought it was good, very good. The bit where it's got the sort of terrace chant, I was thinking 'what the hell is this record?!' It's some sort of R&B-terrace-chant-thing and it's actually Usher. I remember I was in Greenwich Market. I think that was the last time I did something like that with a new song.
For me pop music, and all art really, is about creating a fantastic world of your own, for yourself and others to play in and look at life through. You've always made being fan of yours into a real experience, much beyond what most bands do. Rare singles like 'Lover Plays The Bass', or albums like Misadventures, then the wealth of items that even those of us who kept up enjoyed on the reissues. You DJ and have been making films. Are there any other fields you'd like to explore?
BS: A musical [laughs]. An old musical with just us three singing. We could do that kind of musical singing where you sound very theatrical.
PW: Fashion.
SC: Ooh! Oo yeah, I've thought about that one. Yeah, I wouldn't mind designing a couple of items of clothing.
BS: Pete's got that radio program.
PW: Yeah, a very niche radio program, www.the-seance.com.
Were there bands that you yourselves loved who really gave you that full experience of being a fan?
PW: Dexys were like that.
BS: The Smiths.
PS: Yeah, The Smiths gave us fashion, political attitude, films to watch, books to read, art and other music to seek out. You didn't go along with all of it but you could pick and choose the bits you wanted from each of your favourite bands. For instance when Julian Cope mentions Christo in a song you think he's worth checking out, but when he gores himself on a mic stand, you probably give that a miss [laughs].
SC: I was a huge Felt fan. That was my thing. I just went to every gig, and I would drive around the country to go and see them. Pale Fountains were another one of my favourites like that.
PW: I think Lawrence does it even more now than he used to then - giving a kind of world, a kind of crazy world.
PS: Yeah, having a philosophy and everything. There was a lot of that in the early 80s. It was a really good time to have been a teenager, for that reason.
PW: Then sometimes it was record labels that had a kind of ethos, who released a presence. Postcard was a kind of mysterious world.
BS: The review of the Go-Kart Mozart album in The Guardian where he said 'it's like he's living in a parallel universe where Lieutenant Pigeon and whoever else were the most important influences'. Everyone should be doing that, we need more people to do that! Rather than just citing the bloody canon. I'd really like if a band came along that had a complete - the Manics are a really good example, their manifesto and everything about them was definitely more interesting than the music. I'm sure they'd agree with that. The whole thing they set out, it was so inspiring. We used to hang around with them quite a lot early on. One of the most inspiring groups, I would think.
And my standard last question - Say you've stolen a space shuttle and are flying it directly into the sun, for whatever reason you might have. What would you want the soundtrack to be?
BS: 'More Than A Feeling' by Boston [all laugh].
SC: That's a good one.
PW: I would go with Roger Nichols & The Small Circle Of Friends. Mellow, I can imagine being evaporated to that, would be quite nice.
SC: Uck, though it's awful, the first thing that popped into my head was not even a record I like. It was 'Ace Of Spades'. [all laugh]
PW: Don't you like the record?
SC: Well I do, but I don't love it. I do like it.
PW: You're gonna die anyway. [all laugh] Ace Of Base. [more laughter]
Deluxe editions of Casino Classics and Sarah Cracknell's Lipslide are out now.
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| https://www.udiscovermusic.com/artist/saint-etienne/ |
Saint Etienne
The British
dance pop band comprised of Pete Wiggs, Sarah Cracknell, and Bob Stanley have
made music that has been influential on decades of pop.
Published on
May 11, 2020
While the theory that a frustrated rock star is trapped inside the body of every able music journalist could be debated until the cows come home, there have certainly been instances where ambitious members of the media have laid down pen – or laptop – and strapped on a guitar for the greater good.
Alan McGee’s legendary Creation imprint, for example, released highly collectable vinyl from Jerry Thackray (aka influential NME journalist Everett True) and future Sounds correspondent John Robb’s post-punk combo The Membranes, while The Loft – further hotly-tipped contenders from McGee’s stable – consisted of no less than three part-time music scribes.
Also, regulars in print during the late 80s were two highly respected writers who arguably left a more lasting impression on the British pop scene over the next decade. Friends since childhood, Bob Stanley and Pete Wiggs had both been involved in an acclaimed indie-pop fanzine called Caff during the mid-80s, before Stanley (who has since written for The Times and The Guardian) went on to become a regular contributor to UK rock weekly Melody Maker between 1989 and ’91.
Fans of an eclectic array of sounds from the pop world past and present, the pair collectively conceived their own outfit, Saint Etienne (copping the name from top-flight French football team AS Saint-Etienne) with the intention of making euphoric, chart-friendly records that alchemised 60s soul and classic British pop with 70s dub and dabs of acid and deep house.
The duo timed their entrance into the marketplace to near perfection. With the Madchester explosion having recently made stars of bands such as Happy Mondays and The Stone Roses, and DJ Andrew Weatherall’s influential remix of Primal Scream’s ‘Loaded’ kicking open the door for the indie-dance revolution on the cusp of the 90s, the charts were awash with trippy, dancefloor-friendly 45s when Saint Etienne recorded their first song: a smart cover of Neil Young’s ‘Only Love Can Break Your Heart’, built upon breakbeats, Italian house-style piano figures and a seductive vocal from Moira Lambert, formerly of indie contenders Faith Over Reason.
Reputedly recorded in producer Ian Catt’s bedroom in just two hours, the song snagged Saint Etienne a deal with Jeff Barratt’s hip Heavenly imprint and was released as the band’s first 45, climbing to No.95 on the UK chart. Lambert’s vocal performance was widely praised, but Stanley and Wiggs had actually conceived Saint Etienne as a collaborative project, so their second Heavenly 45, ‘Kiss And Make Up’ (adapted from UK indie outfit The Field Mice’s tune ‘Let’s Kiss And Make Up’), featured vocals from Donna Savage, on loan from New Zealand popsters Dead Famous People.
The third Saint Etienne single, May 1991’s ‘Nothing Can Stop Us’, again featured a different female vocalist, Chelmsford-born Sarah Cracknell, who had previously performed with Windsor-based indie foot soldiers The Worried Parachutes, and cut several singles during the late 80s with a band called Prime Time. Wiggs and Stanley’s collaboration with Cracknell was also intended as a one-off, but the trio clicked from the off, and ‘Nothing Can Stop Us’ – which leant on a smartly deployed sample from Dusty Springfield’s version of ‘I Can’t Wait To See My Baby’s Face’ – was so positively received by the critics and performed so well commercially (cracking the UK Top 75 and appearing in America’s Dance Charts for a week) that the trio continued working together full-time.
Saint Etienne scored a lot of crucial support in the UK rock weeklies NME and Melody Maker, and their Heavenly Records debut, Foxbase Alpha (reissued in a 2CD Deluxe Edition during 2009) reflected the band’s growing popularity when it charted at No.34 in the UK upon its release in September 1991. A pleasingly eclectic affair, the LP demonstrated the band’s love of everything from classic 60s pop (‘Nothing Can Stop Us’, ‘Wilson’) to reggae (‘Carnt Stop’ (sic), based upon 70s producer Glen Brown’s ‘Youthman’ rhythm) and longer, ambient-tinged outings such as ‘Stoned To Say The Least’, which recalled The Orb at their amorphous best.
The band went one better with their second LP – and arguable career-best – So Tough, which was released through Heavenly in March 1993, charting at an impressive No.7 in the UK. As with Foxbase Alpha, the LP was granted a Deluxe Edition 2CD release in 2009, with a raft of B-sides and bonuses, and it remains an accomplished and beautifully crafted pop LP, chock full of infectious melodies and topped off by Cracknell’s alluringly dreamy vocals. The album’s name derived from The Beach Boys’ 1972 LP, Carl And The Passions – “So Tough”, and it also ingeniously utilised clever samples of dialogue from cult movies such as Lord Of The Flies, Billy Liar and The Picture Of Dorian Gray as links between its tracks.
Andy Weatherall’s dub-infused remix of ‘Only Love Can Break Your Heart’ had previously (if briefly) introduced Saint Etienne to the UK Top 40, but So Tough also spawned an impressive quartet of hits courtesy of the wistful ‘Avenue’, ‘Join Our Club’, the double A-side ‘Hobart Paving’/‘Who Do You Think You Are?’, and the irresistible, Bruce Forsyth-referencing ‘You’re In A Bad Way.’ The latter – which was given a makeover by ex-Cliff Richard producer Alan Tarney for its 45RPM release – rose to No.12, giving Cracknell, Stanley and Wiggs their first Top 20 hit.
Issued in June 1994, Saint Etienne’s third LP, Tiger Bay, was their last for Heavenly. Most of the songs were initially conceived in the rural isolation of Gloucestershire’s Forest Of Dean, and a number of them – not least ‘Former Lover’ and the haunting traditional English folk song ‘Western Wind’ – had noticeably rootsier leanings. Elsewhere, ancient and modern clashed to staggering effect on ‘Like A Motorway’, which melded Kraftwerkian proto-techno and the melody from the 19th-century folk song ‘Silver Dagger’, demonstrating that, stylistically, the sky was still the limit for the band.
Tiger Bay also bequeathed two of St Etienne’s most enduring Top 40 hits in ‘Hug My Soul’ (co-penned by Sarah Cracknell and songwriting duo Guy Batson and Johnny Male) and the exotic ‘Pale Movie’, which ingeniously blended a Euro-dance backbeat with Spanish guitars and was promoted with a memorable video of the band riding scooters around Nerja in the Spanish province of Andalusia.
The trio’s close relationship with commercial success continued with 1995’s self-explanatory Too Young To Die: The Singles 1990-1995, which climbed to No.17 in the UK charts. Its spirited performance earned the band a silver disc for sales of over 60,000 copies, as well as an upbeat, dance-enhanced Top 20 UK hit, ‘He’s On The Phone’, which was written and performed in collaboration with French singer-songwriter Etienne Daho. The CD came with a bonus second disc featuring a raft of B-sides and remixes, which was later released as the standalone collection Casino Classics, and reached No.34 in the UK on its own merits.
Saint Etienne transferred to Creation Records in 1996, but their lone LP for the label, Good Humor, only materialised in 1998, partly because Alan McGee’s team were committed to promoting Oasis’ massive-selling third LP, Be Here Now, in the summer and autumn of 1997. Recorded at Tambourine Studios in Malmö, Sweden, with The Cardigans’ producer Tore Johannson, Good Humor continued the move away from the band’s trademark synth-driven indie-dance sound that had begun with Tiger Bay, with Johannson bringing in a full band, including a horn section. The LP was still suffused with delectable pop, however, not least the dub-infused ‘Wood Cabin’, the shimmering ‘Lose That Girl’, and ‘Sylvie’, which peaked at No.12 in the UK Top 40 singles chart. Its parent album rose to No.18 in the UK Top 20 and also sold well in Scandinavia, where it climbed to No.11 in Norway.
The band greeted the new millennium with Sound Of Water, released through Beggars Banquet subsidiary Mantra in June 2000. Recorded in Berlin, with arrangements from post-rock duo To Rococo Rot and The High Llamas’ Sean O’Hagan, it was something of a stylistic departure, with dreamy, ambient textures and electronica largely usurping the warmer, poppier feel of Good Humor. The LP’s ambitious (unedited) nine-minute trailer single, ‘How We Used To Live’, narrowly missed the charts, though third single ‘Boy Is Crying’ rose into the Top 40, as did Sound Of Water, which eventually peaked at No.33 in the UK.
Saint Etienne have continued to enjoy considerable acclaim this side of the millennium. Though it also contained a couple of typically ravishing pop tracks such as ‘Stop & Think It Over’, much their next LP, 2002’s Finisterre, continued to explore the ambient electro-vibe of Sound Of Water and peaked at No.11 in the US Top Electronic Albums chart. Akin to the content of Scott Walker’s ’Til The Band Comes In, meanwhile, Tales From Turnpike House (issued in 2005 and released by Sanctuary) consisted of tracks depicting characters who lived in the eponymous block of flats (which actually exists and can be found on London’s Goswell Road). The record itself boasted some fabulous music, including ‘Stars Above Us’ and the dancefloor-friendly ‘A Good Thing’, as well as a surprise guest vocal from 70s pop star David Essex on ‘Relocate’.
Featuring an extensive two CDs that took in the band’s hit singles, album tracks and remixes, plus a bonus DVD of promos, Heavenly’s career-spanning anthology, London Conversations: The Best Of Saint Etienne, appeared in 2009, followed by Words And Music By Saint Etienne. Released by Universal Music/Heavenly in May 2012 – and, to date, the band’s most recent fully-fledged studio LP – this latter contained some of the trio’s most well-executed songs, ranging from the nostalgic ‘I Threw It All Away’ to the Northern soul-esque ‘Haunted Jukebox’ and the memorable single ‘I’ve Got Your Music’, which neatly referenced Donna Summer’s 1977 hit ‘I Feel Love’. Attracting almost universal acclaim from critics, Words And Music By Saint Etienne sold strongly from the off and deservedly reacquainted this most enduring and inventive of modern pop bands with the UK album charts, climbing to No.26 within weeks of its release.
Cracknell, Stanley and Wiggs have been busy with side projects in the interim, but reconvened to supply the gorgeous, introspective soundtrack to director Peter Kelly’s acclaimed 2014 film, How We Used To Live: a fascinating celluloid history of London put together using footage from 1950-80. Saint Etienne have since performed the soundtrack at sold-out shows at London’s Barbican Centre and at the Sheffield Doc Centre and took the same set around the UK on a five-date mini-tour in May 2015. Meanwhile, with a number of special festive showed staged in December 2015, and hints of new material in the wind, St Etienne may be in for further skirmishes with the Top 40.
Words: Tim Peacock
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| https://www.gigwise.com/features/92124/ |
Three British Bands That I Liked In The 90s: #1 – Saint Etienne
Bob Stanley and Pete Wiggs can’t believe that they get to hang out with Sarah Cracknell
So with the photo post the other day, I suppose the 90s gauntlet has been thrown. It’s true. While I enjoyed my life in the 90s [actually more than I can say about the 80s, really] the one point of no comparison was when it came to new bands. My long term enjoyment of UK bands was definitely on the rocks as the late 80s rave culture was still dominant in the music scene. Following the mid 80s flowering of the NWOBJP, the ecstatic flow of UK club music on the underground side vied with the PWL steamroller to almost universally repel my normally inquisitive ears. It seemed to be music of a time of diminished expectations. In that sense, it perfectly reflected its zeitgeist.
It was during this time that I became a Francophile for a good seven years… At least until the French discovered hip hop! The new English bands that appealed to me the entire decade, can be counted on the fingers of a single hand. Of a woodworker… with bad judgement. I had bought the occasional album by English pop acts in 1990. A group like The Sundays was a perfect example. Not a bad album. I bought it on import long before they got signed to whatever label they had in The States. But one album of them was enough for my Record Cell. Not enough there there to bring me back for extra helpings. Multiply that experience by ten years, and you’ll have a good idea of what British music meant to me around that time.
In 1991, I managed to hear the first new UK act in about five years that managed to attract my attention. I spent a lot of time in my car listening to WPRK-FM, which continued to be the only radio station in Central Florida that didn’t repel me. My car only had a cassette deck and I had not made any cassette tapes in six years of buying CDs, so any tapes I had were of older music. I generally relied on WPRK for my in-car entertainment. It was there that I chanced to hear St. Etienne. I later bought a copy of their debut album, “Fox Base Alpha.”
The band had some traits of the indie dance era that I had not really found terribly appealing. Sampling had gone off the rails by the mid-80s, and the ambient house scene often featured samples used in a non-musical context to provide the emotional vibe that was otherwise lacking in the faceless music being ground out like sausages. So there were a lot of samples bitten from films everywhere. Sampling, which had begun with the impossible sheen of utter modernism in 1980, had by 1991, calcified into an entirely regressive technique that was only looking backward. What hooks can we bite from old records?
I can’t say that St. Etienne were head and shoulders above this way of thinking, at least musically. They proffered an album with gentle house beats and drum machines, with plenty of atmospheric samples. The production style of the album was certainly of its era. What distinguished the album were several factors. Firstly, the vibe here was unabashedly retro with late 60s soul music being a strong thread running through the album even thought the chatter of drum machines and samples were right up front. The nostalgic air that pop scientists Bob Stanley and Pete Wiggs cultivated here had a heavy air of melancholia swirled through it all, giving me something a little more than could be found in the less emotional records that sounded, on the face of them. not wholly dissimilar to this one.
Secondly, the ratio of non-musical atmosphere to actual songs was just about right. This was the era where sampling collage began to overtake music as an expressive form. This would peak in the mid-late 90s with things I’d hear on WPRK being non-musical sampling collage with little musical content. At the end of the day, such efforts don’t connect with me emotionally. They are too abstract for me to bond with them. Here there were tracks like “Wilson” which were solely looped film dialogue over a beatbox. Tracks were bookended with samples taken from a wide variety of sources to add a sort of greek chorus to the album. There was enough of this to provide au courant novelty without taking up space better saved for music.
Finally, with main vocalist Sarah Cracknell, they found a lady who can hit the Motown/Philly Soul vibe with a mannered air of nonchalance that was simultaneously intimate yet ultimately cool. One got the thought that Sarah Cracknell was singing to/for herself even if she was addressing someone in the lyrics. But that’s okay. The effect on many of these songs makes me think I am listening to a Post-Modern remix of a group like The Three Degrees. It attains a vibe of sounding second hand even when the song in question brand new. The bittersweet nostalgia [especially reflected in the samples and the packaging of the discs themselves] is utterly endemic to the Saint Etienne sound. It’s comforting sounds in the wrong container that aren’t quite a perfect fit for them. The dissonance created makes them ultimately interesting.
Do I collect Saint Etienne? Absolutely not! I’m not made of money! I don’t even have all of their easy to get albums. I have “Fox Base Alpha,” “So Tough,” “Tiger Bay,” Good Humor” and “Tales Of Turnpike House.” My favorite was “Good Humor” due to the band moving away from the indie dance tropes that they waltzed in on and focusing more on what I would call classic songwriting. The band have an impossibly deep and detailed discography with as many fannish nooks and crannies as main tributaries. One could go deeply into debt trying to have everything. It’s a sign of moderation of my collector’s sickness that I can enjoy Saint Etienne without feeling the need to “have it all” as I so often do. If I see a Saint Etienne CD at a good [and <$5.00 is always good in my book…] price, then chances are I will purchase it.
The only rarities I have in the Record Cell are the band’s debut CD single with the far superior early Donna Savage vocal version of “Kiss And Make Up” and a US promo CD5 of “Stars Above Us” US remixes from “Tales Of Turnpike House.” I also have the US solo album “Lipslide” and “Kelly’s Locker” EP from Sarah Cracknell which managed to be almost as good as a Saint Etienne release, so good for her. I also have the conceptually perfect Saint Etienne Daho EP “Reserection,” where long time Francophile favorite Etienne Daho collaborated with the band on a five track EP, with one song being an English version of his “Week-End à Rome.”
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Blog Vacation Two 2022 - Vacation II Post #96
I took a "Blog Vacation" in 2021 from August 31st to October 14th. I did not stop posting daily; I just put the blog in a low power rotation and mostly kept it off social media. Like that vacation, for this second blog vacation now in 2022, I am alternating between reprints, shares with little to no commentary, and THAT ONE THING, which is an image from the folder with a few thoughts scribbled along with it. I am alternating these three modes as long as the vacation lasts (not sure how long), pre-publishing the posts, and not always pushing them to social media.
Here's the collected Blog Vacation I from 2021:
Saturday, October 16, 2021
A Sense of Doubt blog post #2433 - BLOG VACATION 2021 COLLECTED
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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 2205.31 - 10:10
- Days ago = 2524 days ago
- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.
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