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Track Listings
| 1. Everything Flows |
| 2. Orpington Blues |
| 3. Who Do You Think You Are |
| 4. Some Place Else |
| 5. Duke Duvet |
| 6. Paper |
| 7. Johnny In The Echo Cafe |
| 8. Archway People |
| 9. California Snow Story |
| 10. Join Our Club |
| 11. Everlasting |
| 12. Snowplough |
| 13. Rainy Day Women |
| 14. Peterloo |
| 15. I'm Too Sexy |
| 16. Stranger In Paradise |
| 17. Hobart Paving |
Product Description
Review
This is curious, for the 1993 record was created from a very similar palette to that employed by Britpop’s songwriters – an updated 1960s soundtrack to narratives of everyday London life – but to far superior results. Saint Etienne’s observations were keener, their aesthetic more refined and the very songs smarter than what was to come a year or so later. In part, this is because while Saint Etienne loved to find beauty in the mundane (“Bruce on the old Generation Game” and squeezy ketchup bottles in Kentish Town cafes) unlike the majority of their contemporaries they weren’t afraid to explore sounds from beyond the English coast, be it French pop, hip hop or global electronica.
It’s perhaps because of this diversity of influence that So Tough still sounds skittish and fresh today. Leafhound echoes the piano sounds that characterised early 90s dance records, and Conichita Martinez has a European disco feel heightened by the repeated vocal and scrambled guitar lines that appear as if you’d suddenly stumbled across them on a short wave radio. You’re in a Bad Way still stands up as a bona-fide pop classic, while on the equally elegant Avenue, sumptuous “oooohs” suddenly disappear into a stately harpsichord interlude without creating a pretentious non-sequitur. It represents an ambition sadly seen from too few groups since. Calico, meanwhile, anticipates trip hop, and Junk the Morgue is a curious transatlantic cousin of Madonna’s Erotica.
While Bob Stanley and Pete Wiggs’ ability to combine the influences gleaned from their prodigious record collections made Saint Etienne ripe for a cerebral dancefloor, it was Sarah Cracknell’s versatile singing (breathy one moment, soulful the next) that was key to creating an overarching (but never overly arch) identity out of these disparate moods. It’s certainly more effective than Saint Etienne’s stylistic device of connecting each track with clips of dialogue from obscure British film or snatches of conversation, which feels hackneyed and dated, disrupting the album’s flow. Nevertheless, this is a minor quibble, and by rights So Tough’s reissue reasserts a forgotten treasure as one of the finest British albums of the 90s. --Luke Turner
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CD Description
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Customer Reviews
The follow up to Foxbase Alpha had a lot to live up to and it just about pulls it off. Calico is dirty and rusty. Conchita Martinez is squally and frantic and Avenue is still to this day one of the most beautiful and heart wrenching songs I've ever heard. It sounds like Dusty Springfield dropping acid with the Beatles.
It's marvellous and should've been huge but just became another lost classic. Hearing it after all these years brings back some great memories.
So: a must for those who don't already own So Tough and a nice-to-have for everyone else.
I still have mixed feelings about the deluxeproject (and the Boxette before): great that all rarities are available for all but you loose that feeling as a fan when you have found that special and extremely rare CD somewhere. What is a limited edition when a few years down the line it's a massproduct? Still, mixed feelings are the best feelings!
If you're expecting to hear a remastered version of the 1992 album you knew and loved, beware this is not exactly that album.
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