For the life of me, I don’t understand why it’s taken me almost twenty years from falling in love with this record to purchasing it. As a punk kid coming into college spinning emo, hardcore, and metalcore, Bell & Sebastian felt woefully uncool. Hushed, bookish folk songs about college sexcapades, chronic fatigue syndrome, and complicated relationships with local veterans don’t exactly hit the same way as, say, Sunny Day Real Estate, mewithoutYou, or Norma Jean.
But something about Stuart Murdoch’s sardonic wit and the understated whimsy of the arrangements embedded itself in my flesh like a fishhook, and no amount of too-cool punk attitude could pull it out.