The songs on Scottish indie pop architects
Belle and Sebastian's tenth studio album,
A Bit of Previous, wander through various energetic and sunny approaches, but they're tied together by thematic undercurrents of aging, anxiety, and existential questioning. Recorded and produced by the band at their practice space, every tune sounds comfortable and considered. The production and arrangement choices feel thoughtful rather than labored over, as if the walls of handclaps on "If They're Shooting at You" or the unrelenting harmonica that's going for the majority of "Unnecessary Drama" were deliberate choices the group decided on over the course of months. This at-home feeling might also account for how wildly they swing between styles over the course of the album's 12 songs. "Young and Stupid" utilizes violin and bright acoustic guitars to guide sticky melodies, and there's a hint of nostalgia in the kind of chamber-pop sweetness (French horn,
Enoch Light-styled backing vocals) that appeared on the band's earliest material 26 years prior. Almost immediately, however, they switch gears for the mellow quasi-soul of "If They're Shooting at You," the moody synth pop on "Reclaim the Night," a lush Baroque country-folk waltz on "Deathbed of My Dreams," or a bouncy indie reading of Motown on "Come On Home." The stylistic hopscotch the band play here recalls the staggered but intentional flow of their 2003 album
Dear Catastrophe Waitress, and like that record,
A Bit of Previous rewards listeners who can ride out the zigzagging with a deeper cohesion that takes a few listens to sink in.
At this point in
Belle and Sebastian's discography, their calling cards are well-established, and the songs are full of their particular brand of soft, smiling melodies, and arrangements that bubble up without feeling too crowded or overwrought. What feels different among the familiar, sometimes self-referential songwriting is an ongoing thread of uneasy, darkly self-reflective lyrical themes. This can be as blatant as lines about increasingly creaky bones and settling into middle age on "Young and Stupid," or as intense as the stark look at anxiety and self-sabotaging patterns on the jittery "Talk to Me Talk to Me." The perky, joyful sounds are always just slightly louder than the swirls of dread that buttress
A Bit of Previous. It's in the album's unlikely combination of weighty sentiments and cheerful (if especially diverse) sounds that
Belle and Sebastian grow, offering up an honest assessment of what getting older feels like when you're one of the world's best indie pop bands. ~ Fred Thomas