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Belle and Sebastian | I'm Waking Up To Us

B&S continue their more soulful sound.
CDS, Jeepster/Zomba

Tekst: Wilko van Iperen

Publicatiedatum: 05 december 2001

'I'm Waking Up to Us', the new single from Belle & Sebastian, is a continuation of the more soulful sound of the last album 'Fold Your Hands Child, You Walk Like A Peasant'. This new song is, like the ones on the last album, backed by lots of strings, which gives it an orchestral sound. But, in spite of the rich presentation, 'I'm Waking Up to Us' still sounds like an effort to make an ironic version of a Motown tearjerker. A good tearjerker indeed, and with Belle & Sebastian almost all lyrics to their songs are ironic, but this time the whole sound of the song seems ironic. The second song on Belle & Sebastian's last single 'Jonathan David' contained a melody that sounded like the Motown song 'I've Never Been to Me' by Charlene. The second song on this single starts off great. It opens with guitar strumming right out of the heart of a dewy summer morning and turns into a happy nod-along-song and is also excellently composed. Listen to the clarinet, banjo, and trumpet! But the sound and a small part of the refrain somehow reminds me of The Beatles. It's not like the 'I've Never Been to Me' case as on the last single, which was obvious, but it just sounds alike. When hearing the third song, 'Marx and Engels', I started asking myself why they even started adopting this fuller soul-sound anyway, because this is as good as it gets: a plain, melodic, honest guitar song, on which the booklet notes, "we managed to play this by ourselves." No need for orchestras and all kinds of extras when you can deliver tunes like these that don't sound like anything but Belle & Sebastian. What a fine melody! Even my girlfriend, who I drive crazy with my "music this" and "music that", wanted to hear this one again immediately. This is like the songs were on 'The White, Red, or Green Album'. But although I prefer the earlier stuff of Belle & Sebastian, I'll let myself be rocked asleep (again?) by these new songs. And, referring to the sounding-like-The-Beatles-part-of-a-song, I just want to say: "Every man to his trade." But I'm still wondering if that fits Belle & Sebastian or me.

http://www.kindamuzik.net/recensie/belle-and-sebastian/i-m-waking-up-to-us/925/
Meer Belle and Sebastian op KindaMuzik: http://www.kindamuzik.net/artiest/belle-and-sebastian