Belle & Sebastian - Storytelling
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Category: Music CD
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Music CD Cover
Artist: Belle & SebastianEdition: Music CD
Format: Soundtrack
CD Release Date: 2002-06-04
Music Label: Matador Records
Soundtracks:
- Fiction
- Freak
- Dialogue: Conan, Early Letterman
- Fuck This Shit
- Night Walk
- Dialogue: Jersey's Where It's At
- Black and White Unite
- Consuelo
- Dialogue: Toby
- Storytelling
- Dialogue: Class Rank
- I Don't Want to Play Football
- Consuelo Leaving
- Wandering Alone
- Dialogue: Mandingo Cliche
- Scooby Driver
- Fiction (Reprise)
- Big John Shaft
Free Music Notes for Storytelling
Free Music Review: Perhaps not vintage B&S, but an excellent, cohesive record
Hit: 5 Stars
I've been listening to Belle and Sebastian for awhile, and though I found this CD to be a departure from the group's normal work, it certainly does not deserve the negative reviews that some reviewers here have bestowed upon it.On the contrary, "Storytelling" has a permanent home in my portable CD player, and it has the special ability to appeal to my parents when I play it aloud at home. The instrumentals are luscious and demonstrate the truly powerful presence of Belle and Sebastian as a group - sometimes they number 20-odd people on-stage, rather than their stated size of 7-8 performers (now down one person, I'm afraid, with Isobel's departure from the group). B&S's music often works in an amazing orchestral form, so I was happy to see what the group members can do as instrumentalists.
The humorous bits of spoken word [which I assume came from the film] were effective and fun. My favorites: "Maybe they make fun of New Jersey all the time. But I don't care. They're just snobs. Cause New Jersey's where America's at!" And: "When I go to high school I'm not going to play any football. I'm just going to concentrate on class rank." These quotes are awesome, interesting, ironic: Pure belle and sebastian (on a USA-inspired buzz).
The vocal selections are excellent as well. "Storytelling" is a great testament to and criticism of Todd Solondz. "Black and White Unite," "Wandering alone," and "Big John Shaft" work wonderfully. "I don't want to play football" IS hilarious AND charming. Whatever other people may think is fine; I think that this album works. Each piece fits together really well; the pieces flow, and I keep repeating songs over and over so that I can continue my B&S fix.
Whether or not you're a Belle and Sebastian fan I highly recommend this album. If you're a first-time listener try If You're Feeling Sinister, but you don't have to like B&S to love this album. You just have to be open to a group diversifying its music and experimenting with melodic lines that they were never able to develop for the actual Storytelling film.
Storytelling Poster
Special Low List Price: 34 minutes of new music from Belle and Sebastian, comprised of both instrumental film score and six new vocal tracks. The soundtrack to Todd Solondz's "Storytelling", starring Selma Blair, John Goodman and Paul Giamatti.Given Belle & Sebastian's eccentric way of doing things, it's hardly surprising that their soundtrack to the Todd Solondz movie Storytelling did not work out quite as planned. Plenty of bands have written scores to imaginary movies. Belle & Sebastian, however, have composed an imaginary soundtrack to an existing movie; only six minutes of this music was actually used in the film, and much of it was completed after the film was released. The weird thing is, it all fits together rather nicely. Storytelling is a more consistent beast than the last couple of B&S albums; the discipline of writing (vaguely) to order seems to have made the band perversely less uptight. Stevie Jackson's ambling harmonica piece, "F*** This S***," is a close cousin to his beautiful work with the Bill Wells Trio--and also, explicitly, Dylan's soundtrack to Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid. Amidst the lilting instrumentals and snatches of dialogue from Solondz's fine movie is a clutch of quietly impressive songs. "Black and White Unite" continues Stuart Murdoch's artful reorganization of the legacies of Love and Simon & Garfunkel, while on "I Don't Want to Play Football" he chooses to stereotype himself further as the sickly child always picked last at games. Best of all, there's "Storytelling" itself, in which Sarah Martin pursues the issues of authorial responsibility tackled by Solondz in the movie. "In directions, actions, and words, cause and effect, you need consistency," she politely chastises, targeting Solondz as much as his characters. --John Mulvey
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