Latest Posts

Belle and Sebastian – Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance

January 19, 2015

After a nearly five year hiatus, the Glasgow natives, Belle and Sebastian, reunite with the group’s ninth studio album, Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance. That’s not to say that the members of the band have not been keeping busy though.  In 2014, the lead singer Stuart Murdoch wrote and directed the film God Help The Girl, after making a soundtrack to the film with his musical side project of the same name back in 2009.  The film was way too quirky for my tastes, and I was really worried this new record would have the same effect on me, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that I was I wrong. Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance is sonically a breath of fresh air for Belle and Sebastian. While staying true to emotional lyrics revolving around personal struggle, the band is able to deliver a new record with some of the danciest[...]

Column 13: Belle & Sebastian’s Stuart Murdoch Tries On The Movie Musical

October 15, 2014

Expanding on the world he’s created through his music comes Stuart Murdoch’s God Help the Girl. The frontman of indie-pop legends Belle & Sebastian makes his directorial debut with this coming-of-age musical that brings all the same retro twee kitsch and emotional vulnerability that style his music to his debut film. While the film’s plot isn’t terribly dense, the film rather plays through a series of musical vignettes that flesh out it’s characters and speak to it’s wider themes about the various purposes for musical expression. The transition isn’t always seamless as at times, the change in emotional tone that works well in the music is slightly more jarring on screen. The film also seems to runs a bit longer than it needs to, as if Murdoch was intent on finding room for every song written in the film. That said, when these sequences work (and the majority do), they really[...]

God Help The Girl Opens at the North Park Theatre

October 3, 2014

One of the most exciting development in Buffalo this year has been the rebirth of the venerable North Park Theatre on Hertel Avenue. Beyond the wonderful ongoing renovation efforts restoring the theater to a condition minter than in our wildest dreams, it’s the revamped programming made possible to the upgraded digital projection system that’s re-positioning the North Park as one of the cultural focal points of the city, with an Italian film festival, a well curated family matinee series, and other special shows like Monty Python Live and the NY Films Critics series. This bold programming continues this weekend with the local debut of international indie film God Help The Girl from Belle & Sebastian’s Stuart Murdoch. Originally a girl group offshoot of Belle & Sebastian featuring songs by Murdoch written from a female perspective, the work evolved into a cycle of songs and a script and low budget indie movie[...]