“Funny Little Frog”
from the album The Life Pursuit
2006
iTunes
Stream Belle & Sebastian’s video for “Funny Little Frog” [Real]
What do you think could be classed as the life pursuit? Wealth? Happiness? The girl or boy of your dreams? For Belle & Sebastian’s Stuart Murdoch, it’s sometimes seemed like it might be the perfect song. Having previously admitted that he writes with his “record collection looking over my shoulder,” Murdoch’s worked steadily from the orchestral ’60s pop of B&S’s early albums, though the northern soul inflected indie of their mid period, to the ’70s-tinged hyper-pop of 2003’s Dear Catastrophe Waitress, trying out each style for size.
The results have, in part, been heartbreaking, uplifting, inspiring and infused with bolt-from-the-blue maverick talent, but there’s always been a sense of something remaining unfinished with Belle & Sebastian — as if they were still looking for that perfect song, still trying to replicate those hallowed first two albums when they didn’t have to try at all. The quest still continues with The Life Pursuit, but these days you get the impression the band have stopped beating themselves up about it all so much. That they’ve learnt to relax and enjoy the ride.
Hence we get an album which, musically at least, veers all over the place, from chamber pop to glam to, God help them, hotel lobby jazz. In other hands, this would be a terrible mess, but in each instance you feel like the group are inching ever closer to that perfect pop moment — and as soon as you’ve twigged that the life pursuit is music itself, then each track becomes a separate stab for a gold medal.
It starts brilliantly. “Act of the Apostle” is a supremely confident orchestral pop classic that takes in dreamlike harmonies, a melody that seems to float upwards as it progresses and what sounds like pool balls crashing together. “Another Sunny Day” and “Funny Little Frog” are gloriously simple, pop breezes that revel three or so minutes of pure melodic happiness. “Dress Up in You” drifts along beautifully, hand in hand with the geeks and outsiders just like the old days. “Mornington Crescent” is them having a crack at The Stones’ “Wild Horses” — and finding, inevitably perhaps, that they can pull this off as well.
The wobbles happen when B&S veer a little too closely to pastiche. “White Collar Boy” is just too David Essex for comfort. “The Blues are Still Blue” is fun, but never quite escapes being a pub rock T-Rex. And the boogie pop of “Sukiein the Graveyard,” meanwhile, just feels unnatural. But if they had to undertake some ’70s experiments to reach the wonderful “For the Price of a Cup of Tea,” which sets B&S pop smack bang in 1973 right next to John Simm, it’s all worth it.
Another unfinished feeling album from Belle & Sebastian then. But this time you know why and where they’re headed next. A noble pursuit indeed.