CD Review: Saint Etienne - The Misadventures of Saint Etienne
Sitting quietly at work, diligently working away I press play on my cd player. I'm confronted with an overwhelming mass of emotions that pull at the very thing that holds my being together. I feel as if I'm falling in love only to have my emotions squashed and my heart broken as each song ends. My feelings are not within my grasp. Each chord pumped the blood through my body. My heart races.
"I try to wake up but my mind is still foggy".
Am I dreaming or am I actually awake? I know I've been here before. I turn up the volume to block out the idle chatter around me. As the drum machine kicks in, the beat just eggs them on... bringing more motivation to take the world and proclaim it their own. I'm in an empty field.. surrounded by nothing by the yellowish tint of dying grass in the quiet autumn cold. Suddenly there is a rain shower... first slowly dripping onto the empty field around me ... and then faster, faster... as the lightning and thunder crashes around me.
"it seems to me that we've got it all"
The storm is violent now... a steady pounding of lightning brings the trees to their knees. The earth is almost shaking with the violent force of sound. The birds fly south dashing between the sheets of rain. Then it's quiet. We've reached the eye of St Etienne and Sarah's quiet whisper fills the meadow.
I close my eyes. There's a piano behind me. It has all of the depth of a baby grand, yet as I turn and open my eyes it's no longer there. The clouds are starting to break apart and the sun is shining through. I reach for my sunglasses and feel like a popstar in the smokey dank of a Paris bar. This world they've created is quiet and moody but always glowing with a self confident flourish. Surely this kind of effortless hallucination is illegal.
"Lost in a dream I open a door to find somebody there."
There is truth in their world. I don't want to leave, but a meeting has been called and my mac reminds me faithfully a few minutes before. I'd like to squeeze the rest of the cd in, but the songs are too precious to rush.
"Oh it's all gone horribly wrong. What am I going to do?"
Originally published at Excellent Online