SOUNDTRACK: BELLE AND SEBASTIAN-“Pocketbook Angel” (1994).
It’s not often that you get to hear a pretty complete story about how an early (unreleased) song was made. “Pocket Book Angel” is a song that Stuart Murdoch wrote when he was signed on for a class about music production. Stuart David was in the same class and so he was there when they recorded this song.
Stuart David describes the origins and recording process:
The song we recorded was called “Pocket Book Angels” something Stuart had written a few days earlier while he was busking on Ashton lane. It was all about busking on Ashton Lane. Almost everyone who was around that day [in the Beatbox recording studio where the classes were held] played something on it. I played bass, Gerry Campbell, the songwriting tutor played drums, “London” a Pink Floyd addict played lead guitar, soloing wherever he could find the tiniest gap to fill. It was a great pop song, probably all but beaten to death by having instrument after instrument overdubbed on it… But Stuart just let the arrangement develop out of the loose parts everyone played. [Unlike later songs when he was very particular], he didn’t have any overall vision for how he wanted the recording to turn out, and it was a haphazard collaboration.
One evening I let my dad hear the finished recording and he said, “You should stick with that band. I like that. they’ll go places.”
“It’s not really a band,” I told him. “It was just a one-off thing.”
“They’ll go far,” he said. “Stick with them them.”
It is pretty impressive that Stuart Murdoch made this song pretty quickly and had it fleshed out into a recordable idea. Sure, this song sounds like it was recorded on a tape player, but the song is super catchy.
[READ: January 23, 2021] In the All-Night Café
Every time I read a non-fiction book about music, I feel compelled to say that I don’t read a lot of non-fiction books about music. Given the number of bands that I like, the number of books I read about music is fairly low. Indeed, most bands that I really like I don’t care that much about their history or what they have to say.
But I enjoyed Stuard David’s novel and I imagined that his take on the formation of Belle & Sebastian would be pretty interesting. Because they are from Scotland and are a low-key band to begin with. Plus Stuart David isn’t the “main” guy (and isn’t even in the band anymore), but he doesn’t seem like the kind of guy who would write a mean-spirited book either.
And their origin story is really fascinating.
But this book isn’t just about the band. It’s about Stuart David’s life in his mid-twenties in Scotland. It’s also about what it was like to be young in a country that didn’t have a lot if opportunity for youth. It’s also about music and is even about love. (more…)
