-ret-(2).jpeg?width=1200&auto=webp&crop=3%3A2)
It’s safe to say that, in 1996, when Belle & Sebastian recorded and mixed their debut record Tigermilk in five days and put out a limited run of 1,000 LPs, the band didn’t imagine they’d be celebrating its 30th anniversary playing it in full to 5,000 people at the Royal Albert Hall.
But here we are. Back then the band’s aversion to interviews, photos, and touring created a sense of intrigue around them. It also saw them lumped with the ‘twee’ label. But Stuart Murdoch’s stories of outsiders, dancing and dreaming were so much more than that - these were songs that captured the inner lives of the people who heard it. The softness of the music undercut by the bite in lyrics and the worlds Murdoch created. The mystique of the record quickly spread - it was the sound of a group being realised in real time.
