This post was submitted by Zack Rosen

I’ve been having a shitty week. Rain or shine, drunk or sober, I haven’t really been able to match my mood to any of this world’s generally pleasant external circumstances. I can’t listen to Magnetic Fields because my trouble is not romantic and they can’t help. It’s not an angry sort of malaise so The Gossip won’t do anything for me, and Portishead, dark as it is, usually just makes me want to have anonymous sex in a meat freezer. Again, not helpful. So I turned to my old friend Belle and Sebastian. The Scottish masters of adolescent discontent have never lost their ability to charm me through a bad mood, even if it’s by singing along to songs about anorexia and blindness whose problems make mine seem minor. And less tuneful, yes,  but thats part of the fun.

Going through the entire B&S catalogue at this point in my life had an unintended side effect, too: I had forgotten just how much queer content is laced through the early part of their career. I’ve never been able to enjoy anything post “Boy with the Arab Strap,” and even that album is pretty un-gay, so I’m keeping this list to everything between “Tigermilk” and “The Three EPs.” Feel free to suggest latter period songs in the comments and to let me know if I’ve forgotten anything in general. Thanks and enjoy.

9. My Brother, The State I Am In

“My brother had confessed that he was gay. It took the heat off me for a while.”

A veritable bible of formless ennui, the first track on B&S’ first record introduces a gay character in the first stanza. When our narrator’s brother stands up at his sister’s wedding with a sailor “friend” he comes off as being brave, but it might also suggest a hidden homo: the narrator himself. He says that the annoucnement “takes the heat off [himself],” a fact that lead my friend (and frequent TNG commentor Parker) to suggest that maybe the narrator’s listlessness is brought from being in the closet. He also marries a girl to prevent her deportation, but expresses no real affection towards her. So the brother is a definite and the narrator a possible. Either way, a pretty queer start to a great band.

8.  Hilary, If You’re Feeling Sinister.

“She was into S&M and bible studies. Not everyone’s cup of tea…”

Employing a looser definition of queer (see also Me and The Major) puts Hilary, the heroine of “If You’re Feeling Sinister” pretty squarely in our camp. Considering this whole track is about reconciling one’s internal uniquness with the demands of the church, it seems that Hilary has walked herself to death because she can’t fit in. The vicar employs a standard “take two bibles and call me in the morning” approach which probably isn’t going to help her. Stuart Murdoch’s music is so purely concerned with people on the outside, that it’s nice he has some empathy for those who might be queer no matter who they are sleeping with.

7. Judy, Judy and The Dream of Horses.

“The best looking boys are taken, the best looking girls are staying inside.”

Why won’t Judy get out of bed? It’s not clear exactly how she identifies, as she does it with boys and dreams about girls, but its clear she wants to be someplace else. When the boys you like are all taken, and the girls are staying inside (the house? the closet?) it’s not easy to figure out what you are after. Whether Judy wants to steal a horse and go someplace else, or just write a song about it that can make my pain a little better, we’ll never know. But I hope that eventually some of the best looking girls ended up in bed with her.

6. Mary Jo, Mary Jo

“The men you left for women, and the men you left for intrigue and the men you left for dead…”

What a tangled web this band weaves. Besides the fact that the last track on Tigermilk has its main character reading the book mentioned (and titled) after the album’s first track,  I often think of Mary Jo as a narrative cousin to Judy. They are both in album-ending tracks named after them, and both seem to be on the fence about what and who they want. Mary Jo has come out of some tramatic experience stronger for it, but part of that involved leaving some guy for another girl. Whether she’s still with that girl or not I always, who knows. But I enjoy that a song about overcoming hardship could end on such an overtly queer note.

5. The Major, “Me and The Major.”

“He remembers all the punks and the hippies too. He remembers Roxy Music in ’72. “

It’s not capital G Gay (See also number 8) but Me and the Major has the general effect of finding out your homophobic gay uncle used to be The Indian in the Village People. The song is all about generational clash, but it shows more of the effects on the older generation than the younger one. The Major, whose solution to “kids these days” is to throw them in the army, goes slowly insane over the song’s running time. He clearly remembers all the demimonde of his youth, and that includes Roxy Music in 1972. Bryan Ferry’s look during the release of his first album is so over-the-top glam androgynous that it makes David Bowie look like he’s not from the future. That whole era was one of the gayest in musical history, and if The Major was around for it he might not be as straitlaced as you would first think.

4.  Jane, Lazy Line Painter Jane.

“You will have a boy tonight. Or maybe you will have a girl tonight.”

Let’s just say this: No one will accuse Lazy Line Painter Jane of being a prude. The song opens with her on her knees in the mud actively trying not to please someone, and it blows up from there. This girl has a lot of sex. She suffers from Thrush and has to pick up free STD literature to ascertain which “lotions and potions” will best cure what ails her. But what ever she “hopes that they will see” from all this sexual empowerment it’s good to know that doesn’t relegate her attention-getting to dick. Will she have a boy tonight, or will she have a girl tonight? What a high class problem. Sleeping in bus stops? Less high class.

3. Everyone, Seeing Other People.

“You’re gonna have to change and you’re gonna have to go with girls. You’ll be better off, at least they know what they’re doing.”

While this song’s plot is evident in its title, the genders of the people involved sure aren’t. There are very few pronouns used in this song. The only clear one we get is quoted above. They’re making out, and the other boys are lining up to get involved. Is this a hetero sex party? Some teen experiementation among male friends? If going with girls is a change it either means you have a girl who has exhausted all male options, or a boy whose ready to stop fucking around w/ his friends and find someone willing to do more than just give handjobs at sleepovers. Can you guess which option I prefer?

2. Sebastian, Put The Book Back on The Shelf.

“Sebastian, you’re in a mess. You had a dream they called you king of all the hipsters. Is it true, or are you still the queen?

Well that one’s pretty clear. Besides being an early indicator of that unavoidable hipster/homo connection, this song is one of the most overtly gay male Belle and Sebastian characters around. Not much else to say besides the fact that being the king of all The Hipsters isn’t really something to strive for, and that being the queen is pretty impressive. I mean, have you hung out with Hipster fags? It would take a pretty stalwart soul to rule them.

1. Lisa and Chelsea, She’s Losing It.”

“Who needs boys when there’s Lisa around?”

Finally a success story! Lisa meets Chelsea in school and immediately knows that something isn’t right. She’d been abused, her coffee tastes like soap and she doesn’t want to feel abused. Lisa is interested but doesn’t want to make things worse. So tada,an easy solution: Go to another school where “the boys go out with boys and the girls with girls.” Besides the fact that I would’ve loved that school when I was 16, this song has one of the most unequivocally happy endings of any B&S number. If being denied your true desire is making you crazy, find the thing you really need and you’ll find happiness. I like to think that Lisa and Chelsea are together to this very day.

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