Glasgow’s treasured angels, Belle and Sebastian, have returned with their first full studio album in seven years. A Bit Of Previous, the super-group’s 10th studio album, is out via Matador on May 6. This is a momentous achievement for a band who has become a staying power in the indie scene over the last 26 years.
A Bit Of Previous came to be like many 2022 albums: delayed and changed plans led to the creation and final delivery of a more creative, collaborative, and deliberate album than may have occurred if the band had been able to follow through with plans at a LA studio. The record was self-produced and recorded in Glasgow (with contributions from Brian McNeill, Matt Wiggins, Kevin Burleigh and Shawn Everett).
This new set of songs hosts the same comforting trills and soft swills of Belle and Sebastian’s previous works, but also includes a bit of chaos in the mechanics. Ivory tickler Chris Geodes reveals that the album’s lead-off singles “Young & Stupid’ and ‘Unnecessary Drama’ hold a heavier message than the breezy tone the songs insist upon first listen. On ‘Young & Stupid,” “I think some of the looking back is maybe sometimes being done from a place where the protagonist of the song doesn’t necessarily feel great about where they’ve got to,” as referenced in the song’s opening lines:
I was yelling in my sleep
I was crying feeling weak
Do we have to feel this way?
It wasn’t like this yesterday”
A Bit Of Previous has four different art covers across the hard and digital album versions. The covers tell their own story about remembering the past while confronting the present. Each cover shows a person stationed around Glasgow with a Victorian spirit image peering listlessly behind them through the fog. Just like the album itself, the photographs initially feel pleasant and calming before becoming unnerving if you stare at them for too long. This direction was influenced by frontman’s Stuart Murdoch’s Buddhism studies and the ramifications of coming face to face with one’s past (or future reincarnated) self.
But it’s not all so existential. Belle & Sebastian are still a band, looking forward to their next tour and rehearsing between laughs and obscure references. From Geddes the routine is simple:
“We’ll show up in the morning at an absurdly early hour, drink a cup of coffee, wait half an hour while the computer starts up, chat a bit about ’80s TV, restart the computer because someone’s headphones aren’t working, play a song a couple of times, and have a discussion about how similar to the recorded version of the song the live version ought to be to take us up to lunch time. After lunch, I’ll start playing a jazz standard in the hope that the others will join in but they don’t take the bait and instead jam on a ZZ Top song. We play another B&S song before ending the practice early so we can have a zoom call with management to discuss the alarming lack of rehearsal time remaining before the tour starts.
Their U.S. tour kicks off in Asheville this May and is already scheduled out into next year with swoops through the U.K. and Europe. Geddes is most looking forward to Belle and Sebastian’s contribution to the re-birth of live music, catching up with old friends across the world, and the tour necessities of treats and drinks. The only downside being time has caught up with him and and too many “treats” leave him a bit fragile the next day. If Geddes could give any advice to his younger self, it would include practicing piano more, being more selective on the records he wasted his money on, and being less of “an arse.” And the young Geddes’ probable reply?
“Shut it grandad. How much is that copy of How Good Is Good by Mickey and the Soul Generation?”
While nostalgia is certainly a theme of the album, it doubles down that it’s best not to get carried away in rose-tinted memories and to be honest about the wrenches life threw. Because without them, we wouldn’t be here listening to Belle and Sebastian 26 years later.
Watch the video for “Unnecessary Drama” here:
For more from Belle & Sebastian, find them on Facebook, Instagram, and their official website.
Photo courtesy of Hollie Fernando
