Finisterre - Saint Etienne

After a career of perennial underachievement and mainstream neglect, Saint Etienne (Bob Stanley, Pete Wiggs & Sarah Cracknell) returned to the shadowy corners of the limelight with 'Finisterre'. Apparently, 'Finisterre' means the end of the world. Or so I am told.

'Action', which opens the album, wastes no time in sucking you in with a fun, catchy and quirky electro-pop groove. Sarah Cracknell's vocals are truly gorgeous on this number, ...
...their name is of the highest standard. The song is evocative of classic Saint Etienne, masters of dreamy, fuzzy pop.

'Amateur' has a more rocky influence, about as rocky as a band like Saint Etienne can get, perhaps. It evokes an era when Britpop was still the 'in' thing, when Pulp, Blur and their chums troubled the top of the charts (and we were plagued by the inferior end of Britpop in the form of Republica, Menswear and Shed Seven…), ... more

After a career of perennial underachievement and mainstream neglect, Saint Etienne (Bob Stanley, Pete Wiggs & Sarah Cracknell) returned to the shadowy corners of the limelight with 'Finisterre'. Apparently, 'Finisterre' means the end of the world. Or so I am told.

'Action', which opens the album, wastes no time in sucking you in with a fun, catchy and quirky electro-pop groove. Sarah Cracknell's vocals are truly gorgeous on this number, while the plinky-plunky electronica through which Saint Etienne have made their name is of the highest standard. The song is evocative of classic Saint Etienne, masters of dreamy, fuzzy pop.

'Amateur' has a more rocky influence, about as rocky as a band like Saint Etienne can get, perhaps. It evokes an era when Britpop was still the 'in' thing, when Pulp, Blur and their chums troubled the top of the charts (and we were plagued by the inferior end of Britpop in the form of Republica, Menswear and Shed Seven…), and the songs brilliantly evokes this time. 'Summerisle' is another highlight, its flirty vocal underpinned by a laid-back, lazy beat, while 'Shower Scene' is eminently danceable and funky.

However, the good stuff ends just about there. This album is not as cohesive and fluid as the wonderful 'Sound Of Water', the album that preceded it. It continues the Saint Etienne tradition of a love for classic pop but adds tinges of hip-hop, a bit of an ill-advised move it seems. It sounds like Saint Etienne, but also seems like a break from the old trend. The album does indeed sound like a bit of a greatest hits collection. Not in terms of stellar quality, but in terms of a lack of cohesion and central focus, with several songs sounding like they belong elsewhere, seeming that they have almost been pulled from the sky in disparate fashion. As a result, the album is confused and disjointed and the songs which are high in quality suffer.

You get the sense that some of these songs were thrown together in a bizarre juxtaposition of styles rather than having a sense of fluidity. The clumsy 'Language Lab' and dire 'New Thing' are songs so utterly charmless that you wonder if Saint Etienne have really put very much effort into them at all. The instrumental 'The Way We Live Now' is unbelievably tepid. You get the feeling that the album should have been trimmed in half, or maybe even cut down to an EP, retaining the stronger numbers and getting rid of the dead wood. The album makes the band seem tired and lacking in new tricks with which they can impress an ever-resistant music-buying public.

The dizzyingly disingenuous 'Soft Like Me' gauchely melds Saint Etienne's dreamy pop with an absurd rap by Wildflower, whoever she is when she's at home. It sounds truly contrived and ridiculous, so profoundly out of place and inappropriate that you wonder what must have been going through their minds.

The album also borders on illogical pretension. Linking each song is a spoken-word narrative by actor Michael Jayston, who utters such gems as 'the perverse possibilities of the Barbican' in-between songs. Such esoteric leanings are not going to endear Saint Etienne to a public that already seems to have slipped out of their grasp and to critics who think that the band should call it a day.

One plus of the album is Sarah Cracknell's vocals, which are still as gorgeous as ever. Some critics have attacked Cracknell, suggesting that her vocals are devoid of emotion and thoroughly uninteresting, but she has always played the role of ice queen very well: her vocals are cold, clipped and unemotional, and I see no reason why that should change. Her voice of soft, lilting and smooth, never rising above a gentle hum.

This is Saint Etienne's most disappointing release. After the gorgeous 'Sound of Water' they have now moved a step back instead of a step forward. You can write them off at your peril, however, because this is a band with enough ability and enthusiasm to take you by surprise with a brilliant album. With the current climate for synth-driven pop, who knows if Saint Etienne might make a wonderful, glorious return to the scene? I certainly hope so. But, for its disjointed feel and slip-ups on the quality control front, 'Finisterre' is best left alone. 

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