Paperjam

Belle and Sebastian, Birmingham Academy, 26th January 2006

Gigs // Jim // 8th February 2006

Always fancied going to see Belle and Sebastian but had never quite got round to it due to a concern that the whole thing might be a touch on the delicate side, with much acoustic-ness going on and a pasty-faced crowd in NHS specs clutching sick-notes from their mums.

Such concerns were tossed to one side last week as an accomplice known only as “Paul” (due to ongoing investigations into his alleged involvement in a “cartoon related” incident) and I sped towards Birmingham to keep a date with B&S at the ubiquitous Carling Academy.

Prior to the event I had tried to work out exactly how much fun the evening was going to be, using the brand new paper-jam online concert evaluator (PONCE for short). Using exacting statistical criteria, such as the length of wait at the bar, the banter of the frontman/woman and the liveliness of the crowd, PONCE returned a predicted score of 122. This figure indicated precisely fuck all, as we had never used it before. After the gig using freshly gathered data (basically what I could remember the next day) PONCE gave a score of 779.1, indicating that Belle and Sebastian were 639% better than I was expecting. Astonishing! How did this happen? Lets investigate further...

B and S @ the Academy: Busy, lots of girls

We arrived early and had an easy time getting a pint of watered down lager and finding a spot in front of the mixing desk to lurk. Paul was deeply concerned that a man of his petite stature may be prevented seeing what is going on by some huge dreadlocked student barging in front, fortunately the B&S crowd were a fairly short-arsed cosmopolitan bunch. In fact the crowd was fairly light on the usual sort of miserable bastards that turn up to the academy, who scowl at anyone enjoying themselves and make a massive show of stamping on the plastic cups.

Indie super-group Brakes (comprising bits of the Electric Soft Parade and British Sea Power) took to the stage and played a series of songs that lasted about 20 seconds each, with a lot of shouting in. Fantastic. Unfortunately they also threw in some dull rambling muso stuff which seemed even longer due the intermittent 10 second thrashes. All was saved by their last song which actually took longer to announce than it did to play, it was called Comma, Comma, Comma, Full Stop – although I think he did say “Comma” four times.

After Brakes sloped off the place really started to fill up, which I wasn’t expecting, especially as when we turned up and they were still selling tickets on the door. As the time approached 9pm my bladder had had enough and I had to head to the gents, the only reason I mention this is that it was half empty and wasn’t swimming with piss, indicating that the Academy was dominated by a female crowd for once, unusual.

I stumbled back annoying quite a lot of people just as Belle and Sebastian took the stage, from the off my preconceptions were knocked completely askew. Having had a listen to If You’re Feeling Sinister the night before I was expecting: Serious, quiet and fairly miserable. The Belle and Sebastian that turned up were fun, not exactly rowdy but at a push I’d say strident, but above all dead entertaining.

I’ve left it too long to remember exactly what was played but it was a chirpy mixture of the new album and older stuff. The bands sound was tremendous, the live environment giving a weight and conviction to songs like Dylan In The Movies that is absent on the recordings.

B and S in action: "Strident", not miserable

Throughout the whole thing Stuart Murdoch was bouncing about the place like a five year old after a three-day sunny delight binge. His banter with crowd was spot on and the double act he has going with guitarist/singer Stevie Jackson should earn them a few quid on the club circuit in their retirement (the introduction to The Wrong Girl a well worked highlight). There was a glut of audience participation involving tambourine playing, mass whistling and Murdoch plunging off the stage for a bout of crowd surfing, which was claimed as a first for a B&S gig.

Returning for an encore to a rapturous reception the band listen to requests and then convene for a quick conference before doing Seeing Other People at the request of a young lady in the crowd. They round things off (after nearly two hours) with a storming Sleep The Clock Around which is about as ROCK as things get, they leave the crowd satisfied but still baying for more in some quarters even as the lights come up.

In summary: a band you should get out to see even if you really can’t stand their records, not really as fey as their albums would lead you to believe (such as the one that I reviewed here) but not exactly smashing the place up and pissing in the sink either. The style of the gig coupled with the vast number of members that B&S seem to have made me think more of a soul band, which was almost exactly the opposite of what I was expecting. That live album must be great...

The Links Persuit...

Belle and Sebastian Official Site

Not bad at all, but has anyone out there got one of the ringtones?

B and S @ Wikipedia

Oh I'm getting soooo lazy with these links