Was there ever a less likely addition to the Sub Pop roster than Saint Etienne? In the late 1990s, the grunge and punk-associated Seattle label was emboldened to expand its purview, and if Sub Pop was going to gamble on any band, why not one of the UK's smartest, most sophisticated connoisseurs? At the time, the band (signed to Creation back home) was reportedly frustrated with its thoroughly continental reputation, and in 1998 the results of that restlessness, Good Humor, made good on threats to try something new.
Following its formative first three records, all self-produced, the band instead decamped to Sweden-- well ahead of the Western embrace of Swedish indie pop-- to work with an outsider, Tore Johansson. Furthermore, while known for its synths, samples, and programming, the band this time chose to embrace traditional rock instruments, including a horn section. And it's not a coincidence that the "humor" in the title drops the "u" from the anglicized version of that word.
At its best Good Humor capably splits the difference between old Etienne and new, embracing the 1960s as fervently as ever on "Split Screen" and "The Bad Photographer" while adopting that era's studio vernacular-- brass, vibes, electric piano. It also maintains the band's trademark melancholy streak with songs like "Mr. Donut", "Postman", and "Lose That Girl". Perhaps inevitably, given the origins of the album, the band even tips its hat to ABBA on "Sylvie". While perhaps not as immediate as the band's earlier output, these songs remain potent, and anyone that caught the group's full-band tour behind the album will attest that they more than held their own against the group's formidable back catalog.
Yet almost immediately after its release, the band began to retreat back to cult act, creating more homespun music and acting more comfortable on the sidelines than in the spotlight. Indeed, Fairfax High, a collection of material used either as B-sides (in the UK) or as a bonus disc included with Good Humor (in the U.S.), shows Saint Etienne unable to thwart its instinct for collectible ephemera. Granted, the group's innate quality control ensures that even its castoffs are worthwhile, and Fairfax High (included in full in this deluxe edition) features its own share of highlights, including "Hit the Brakes" and the pastoral ditty "Clark Co. Record Fair". This new edition also tacks on the unreleased "Do You Love Me", the wonderfully corny "Emidisc Theme" (which celebrated the launch of Stanley's and Wiggs's shortlived EMI subsidiary imprint), and the spare de-Kid Loco'd original version of "4.35 in the Morning".
Over the course of its next few releases, Saint Etienne gradually returned to form, in a literal sense, bringing back the synths and drum machines to bolster its vision of the sad side of the swinging 60s and returning to London as its inspirational wellspring, a shift culminating with 2005's Tales From Turnpike House, the most recent new Saint Etienne album to date. Pairing the Tales reissue with Good Humor is slightly ironic: The latter album finds the band looking beyond its base, but the former is possibly the most "British" thing the band has done, a concept album set in an Islington high-rise flat whose fictional residents provide song-fodder that ranges from the kitchen-sink quotidian to the whimsical.
This deluxe edition features the original UK tracklist-- in the words of Nitsuh Abebe's review, "one smooth, seamless thing" that remains as strong an entry into Saint Etienne's world as just about anything in its portfolio (and not just because the chart-minded British production team Xenomania had a hand in a couple of its tracks). Unlike the clearinghouse-minded bonus disc of Good Humor, the second disc of Tales From Turnpike House includes several unreleased songs. Sadly, it's missing the album's attendant EP of would-be children's music Up the Wooden Hills as well as some other esoterica. Predictably there are some pleasant surprises, including "Another Cup of Coffee" (an honest to goodness Mike & the Mechanics cover), the clubby "Must Be More", and still more forays into jazzy exotica like "Holiday Song" and "Missing Persons Bureau". The previously released "You Can Judge a Book By Its Cover", on the other hand, would sound almost like a lost new wave nugget were it not for Sarah Cracknell's cosmopolitan coo.
It's helpful that these deluxe editions and their dusted off studio discoveries should arrive now, with the band relatively inactive, as there's a whole lot of worthwhile music to be absorbed and reassessed. But taken in total, they truly underscore Saint Etienne's somewhat unsung status on the pop sidelines. Sure, the group's singles are often its strongest suit, but Saint Etienne has always been a big picture band. If anything, these expanded editions stretch the screen even wider, to CinemaScope proportions, revealing a breadth of Technicolor vision and consistency worthy of such vivid restorations.
