Hailing from Glasgow, Scotland, Belle & Sebastian are lauded as one of the best Scottish indie bands ever formed.  Named after a French children’s book, Belle & Sebastian dominated the 90s after their incarnation in 1996.   The early members of the band included Stuart David, Stuart Murdoch, and those two college students’ music professor. 

The college decided to produce an album entitled “Tigermilk” and it sold 1,000 copies.
Because the record sold any albums, let alone 1,000, the two novice music students decided to form a full-on band with a singer named Stevie Jackson, vocalist and violinist Sarah Martin, Richard Colburn on the drums, Chris Geddes on the piano and a cellist named Isobel Campbell.  Then they developed the follow-up album later on the 1996 entitled “If You're Feeling Sinister”.

The success of their second album allowed Belle & Sebastian to release material that they had created very early on in their career as well as do some eclectic innovative work.  An example of such work “Lazy Line Painter Jane”, which is a single recorded in a hometown church of band founder Stuart Murdoch. This single did not break into the UK’s top 40 but the year 1997 did bring their first top 40 hit with “3.. 6.. 9 Seconds of Light”.

The year 1998 brought along Belle & Sebastian’s most controversial hit “The Boy with the Arab Strap” for a couple of reasons.  The album made it to #12 in the UK, but it was criticized by some as being too much of what they do musically; in other words, the album was a little too earnest and too overreaching.  Others thought the album was genius and one single off of it, “It Could Have Been a Brilliant Career”, was even lauded as one of the best songs of all time.  The other reason why this album was particularly attention-garnering is because it caused strife between the band and the band Arab Strap, a band that happen to share the name of Belle & Sebastian’s album.  But overall, the album was pretty well received.

The band came full circle when their first album, the college-label “Tigermilk”, was re-released as a full album which led to “Fold Your Hands Child, You Walk Like a Peasant”, the band’s first top 10 album in the UK.  Not long after, the band began to splinter and some members went to do solo projects.  But in 2005, after a visit to Israel and Palestine for charity, the existing band members made their 7th album, “The Life Pursuit”.  This was the band’s highest grossing album and best charting record. 

In 2006, the Belle & Sebastian have several honors to and one of them is that they played with the Hollywood Bowl with Los Angeles Philharmonic.  Their third album was named Best Newcomer by the BRIT Awards and the magazine Spin named their album, “If You're Feeling Sinister”, one of the 100 greatest albums ever made during a twenty year period.