Belle and Sebastian - "A Bit of Previous"

Of late indie stalwarts Belle and Sebastian have been having quite an identity crisis. In 2015 they produce a stunning slice of free-form indie dance in the shape of “Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance”. It didn’t sound at all like Belle and Sebastian and was all the better for that. However, you got the feeling that they developed cold feet at the idea of moving too far from the quaint indie bedwetting roots and their next move was to create three quite wretched EP that were a hotchpotch of ideas. Unsuccessfully blending the unashamed dancefloor-orientated feel of Peacetime with the much more meat-and-potato approach of their earlier work.

“A Bit of Previous” does exactly what it says on the tin by trying to return the band to their heyday of twee socially inept vignettes of Love’s labors Lost. Sadly, they miss their mark quite spectacularly by basing their approach on the universally derided “Fold Your Hands Child, You Walk Like a Peasant” as opposed to the magnificence of “The Boy with the Arab Strap”. Basically, it’s an album full of not-very-good 90s Belle and Sebastian.