Oh, I do love Saint Etienne. Why? Well, it's not easily expressed (some previous attempts: here, and here, and here, and here). I often think of them and Belle and Sebastian as of a piece, and what ties them together in my mind is that, more than any others', their music represents something for me - some hazy ideal of elegant disaffectedness, at once brightly lit and sepia-toned, thoroughly contemporary and yet not at all made for these times, breezy and subtle and shot through with something wistful...music for the heart and for the inner life.
I think that there might be as many as three Saint Etienne compilations out there, but this seemed the one to get, and it's sheerest delight across the whole of its 2 x cd playing time - much of it I knew already, some I didn't, but it all, you know, it all just fits.
