“Well, we certainly didn’t mean to poison you.”
It’s a late August afternoon in England, and the three members of Saint Etienne try to offer some much-needed emotional help over Zoom. I’ve simply confronted them with the truth that their current resolution to separate up is each untimely and ludicrous. And the truth that they’re bidding farewell to their followers with a wonderful get together document — “International,” the trio’s thirteenth album — is especially venomous.
“Oh, no. What have we done to you,” says keyboardist Pete Wiggs with amusing.
“We definitely wanted to go out with an album that didn’t sound like a last record,” says keyboardist and writer Bob Stanley. “We were also referencing our debut [1991’s “Foxbase Alpha”], with its upbeat form of positivity. That was intentional.”
“I feel this record might make people want to go back and relisten to our previous work,” provides Sarah Cracknell, the band’s lead singer and co-songwriter. “There are so many elements of what we’ve done in the past, that maybe they’ll go, ‘Yeah, I forgot about Saint Etienne.’ At least that’s what I’m hoping for anyway.”
The band emerged within the early ’90s with a club-friendly cowl of Neil Younger’s “Only Love Can Break Your Heart,” however to name it a dance-pop act can be a disservice to the astonishing physique of labor it’s have amassed throughout the final 35 years. Sure, many Etienne hits depend on artificial beats and a sure European, late-night summer time glamour, however its mystique is equally knowledgeable by the pervasive nostalgia of Burt Bacharach and the cosmopolitan coolness of the ’60s soundtracks by John Barry and Lalo Schifrin.
On 1998’s “Good Humor,” helmed by the Cardigans producer Tore Johansson, the dreamy “Mr. Donut” gave the impression of a cross between the Seaside Boys and Dusty Springfield. The band’s haunting tribute to the Carpenters, “Downey CA,” appeared on 2000’s “Sound of Water” — an icy, melancholy confection, presumably essentially the most absolutely realized album of its profession. And its fastidious requirements of excellence have by no means wavered. “Home Counties,” from 2017, included “Whyteleafe,” a syncretic gem of harpsichord-fueled baroque, electro bass strains and vocals that each cherish and recreate the delights of classic British pop. Final 12 months’s radical “The Night” delved into an angelic strand of beatless ambient.
Why name it quits, then?
“We had been talking about playing live again, which we haven’t done in a while, and we all agreed that we didn’t want to go around in a transit van anymore because we’re getting to a certain age and it’s not good for the joints,” explains Stanley. “I think it was either me or Sarah who mentioned the idea of quitting while we were ahead.”
“I was very much aware of leaving our legacy intact,” agrees Cracknell. “That sounds really wanky, I know, but it seems like it’s the right time for us. Personally, there’s nothing that I’m not proud of about everything we’ve done.”
The band is actually not alone in that evaluation. Its business success has been reasonable throughout the previous twenty years, however a digital gallery of British musical royalty seems on “International.” A duet with Haircut 100’s Nick Heyward, “The Go-Betweens” boasts the angular refrain of an ’80s radio anthem, whereas Orbital’s Paul Hartnoll lends his magic to the tribal bounce of “Take Me to the Pilot.” The brand new wave languor of “Two Lovers” was concocted in tandem with synth-pop wizard Vince Clarke.
“We didn’t really know Vince until he did a remix for us,” says Stanley. “I dropped him a line to thank him, and we went for a curry. A lovely bloke, and easy to get on with. Likewise, I bumped into Nick Heyward at a Jewish book festival where I was interviewing 10cc’s Graham Gouldman. Apart from those two, we’ve known everyone else on the record for the longest time.”
The Saint Etienne universe is expansive by nature, and the band’s 13 albums are solely the tip of the iceberg. Throughout the previous decade, Stanley revealed three music journalism books: one on the start of common music, one other on its twentieth century apex and a more moderen one on the Bee Gees. Along with Wiggs — a childhood good friend — but additionally on his personal, and with Saint Etienne, he has curated greater than two dozen compilations that span fom ’90s downtempo to early ’70s French chanson and the sounds of Liverpool within the second half of the ’60s.
“If you’re true to yourself, your musical influences are going to come out directly in your songwriting or production work,” says Stanley. “The compilations are mostly things that we love, and it’s like a world that you can get into. The older we get, the more we know — so the world gets bigger, I suppose. But it definitely fits all together.”
After which, after all, there are the B-sides. Few bands have celebrated the idea of a B-side as an excuse to discover all types of indirect concepts and atmospheric impressions with the glee of Saint Etienne. Its output in that respect is monumental, and the group has produced nearly as many experimental sketches as common album tracks. A 2017 reissue marketing campaign of most of its data as double-CD units, and fan-club releases akin to 2008’s legendary “Boxette” — a four-disc assortment of obscurities — are a treasure trove.
“Growing up in the ’80s, there were a lot of British bands like China Crisis or the Teardrop Explodes that had a massive hit, but on the B-side did more experimental stuff,” explains Wiggs. “That’s what you can do on a B-side; you can exercise your more weird muscles — and that’s one weird metaphor. Playing around in the studio is always fun.”
“It’s a bit like doing something when no one’s looking,” provides Cracknell. “Like doing it in secret, isn’t it? No one is going to see this, but then they do. One of my favorite B-sides is the Jam’s ‘The Butterfly Collector.’”
I ask the members of Saint Etienne what it was concerning the outdated ’60s data by Bacharach and Barry that captured their creativeness so vividly with their blissful melancholy as a everlasting state of being.
“When you listen to Bacharach or Lalo Schifrin, you think of a sports car driving through the Alps or something like that,” displays Stanley. “It’s very aspirational, but quite intangible as well. It’s suggestive of the kind of world where you would like to live in. I remember moving into a 1930s modernist flat and thinking, ‘Oh no, I’m living like John Barry now.’ It’s something that you want to reach, but you don’t really quite know how to do it.”
“My dad wasn’t into music at all, but he randomly happened to pick up an amazing selection of cassettes,” says Wiggs. “There was a Beach Boys compilation, the debut album by Kate Bush, Simon & Garfunkel. I still love all the moods in that kind of stuff.”
The band plans to observe the discharge of “International” with a farewell tour highlighting its best hits. Within the meantime, the members are starting to consider what life after Saint Etienne may seem like.
“I can’t really think past the next year and a half of doing shows and stuff like that,” says Cracknell. “I think about ridiculous things like fostering cats, or remodeling cottages in Italy. Maybe I’ll write a book, or get back into acting.”
“I’m doing a soundtrack that I need to finish,” says Wiggs. “It would be nice to do the odd EP here and there, DJing and writing music under different names.”
“I’ve still got two books that I’m contracted to write at some point — that’ll probably take me to being 70,” laughs Stanley. “There’s an old tramway that needs volunteers. And I always liked the idea of being a primary school teacher before all this took off. It would be nice.”
