Présenté en direct du stade de Saint Ouen—que...non, Saint Étienne!

September 2, 2016 9:59 AM

A celebration of the 25th anniversary of Saint Etienne's debut album, Foxbase Alpha.
posted by prize bull octorok (8 comments total)

This article sent me on a trip down a youtube rabbit hole late 80's-early 90's dancepop.
posted by Badgermann at 10:38 AM on September 2, 2016

it was about 25 years ago that my older sister, a bored freshman at Wellesley who had not yet figured out where to buy good import music in Boston, wrote me a letter asking me to go to Odyssey Imports in Vancouver, Canada some time and pick up the following albums, and hold on to it until I saw her at Christmas.

1. St Etienne - Foxbase Alpha
2. Massive Attack - Blue Lines
3. Primal Scream - Screamadelica
4. The Orb - The Orb's Adventures Beyond the Ultraworld

She gave me permission to open them and listen to the music for the autumn, so long as I didn't damage them. That one shopping trip changed my life. The seminal moment that I attribute to my current taste in music stems from loading those CDs into a multi-disc rotary changer and hearing the bassline for "Safe From Harm" emerge and instantly capture my attention and imagination; but also the opening bars of their cover of "Only Love Can Break Your Heart" have been with me ever since.
posted by bl1nk at 10:39 AM on September 2, 2016 [9 favorites]

bl1nk,

Wow. Kudos to your sister for her taste. Not a duff disc in the bunch.
posted by the sobsister at 11:03 AM on September 2, 2016

What a perfect album. Hard to believe 25 years have passed since it was new. It's held up really well. That little flute line in "Nothing Can Stop Us Now" fills me with glee!
posted by little mouth at 11:29 AM on September 2, 2016 [1 favorite]

A few years ago, when the first Primavera was played here, the hardest decision on the lineup was deciding to watch either Saint Étienne or Washed Out, but being hard didn't mean it wasn't fast, and Saint Étienne it was. Very unlikely they'd came back here, Washed Out live were a toss if they're going to be good or terrible, and... well, I never expected to see them live. And despite having a few drunken Spaniards around me jumping and shouting allez les verts through most of it, it was still excellent.
posted by lmfsilva at 11:33 AM on September 2, 2016 [1 favorite]

There's also a 2009 version, remixed by Richard X and called Foxbase Beta, which I listen to now more than the original.
posted by lefty lucky cat at 1:34 PM on September 2, 2016

As someone who loves Saint Etienne but didn't really listen to Foxbase Alpha very much (before my time, really), Foxbase Beta was a revelation. It's a fantastic version of the album and sounds basically like the original, transported into the future and recorded for the very first time in 2009 with modern sensibilities.
posted by chrominance at 3:21 PM on September 2, 2016 [1 favorite]

As someone who played the original album to death in the 90s, Foxbase Beta let me hear the songs again, whereas listening to Foxbase Alpha now means, to some extent, listening to the 90s again and all those echoes of my own life.

Although I feel like a run of songs like Carnt Sleep -> Girl VII -> Spring -> She's the One, if one could rewind the entire world and see what happens over and over, would probably end up sounding great about 97 out 100 times, no matter where they ended up in the timeline.
posted by lefty lucky cat at 9:55 PM on September 3, 2016