I wonder if Belle and Sebastian are my favourite band these days? I think they might well be. The BBC Sessions has reminded me of all the reasons why I like them so much by the simple expedient of collecting, across the bbc sessions recordings proper and the bonus 'live in Belfast' disc, many of their absolute best songs - "The State I Am In", "Like Dylan in the Movies", "Judy and the Dream of Horses", "Seymour Stein", "There's Too Much Love", "The Boy With the Arab Strap", "Dirty Dream #2" (a list the incompleteness of which only serves to remind how many other great songs the band has up its sleeve) - and presenting them in versions not terribly different from those so familiar and loved in their lp incarnations...one which is worthy of note is "Lazy Jane", of course an early version of "Lazy Line Painter Jane", which has a very different feel from the barnstorming ep version, being quieter, more 'Stereolab', and more 'calypso' than the other in the absence of Monica Queen to contribute the girl vocals.
Though the songs making it up aren't as consistently great as on the other, I prefer the Belfast disc, both because of its liveliness and fuller sound, and for the three covers - a sweet take on "Here Comes The Sun", a surprisingly faithful "I'm Waiting For The Man", and a sunnily electric version of "Boys Are Back In Town". That said, the bbc sessions disc ends with four B&S songs that I'd not heard before, of which my favourite would have to be "Shoot the Sexual Athlete", though the others, "The Magic of a Kind Word", "Nothing in the Silence" and "(My Girl's Got) Miraculous Technique" all have their charm...oh, lovely!
