Album Review: The Night by Saint Etienne

Another of the trio’s explorations into ambient music, this immersive work conjures images of a city just before dawn rises, with the faint sound of birdsong and the constant drizzle of rain Saint Etienne are responsible for one of the best Christmas songs of modern times (I Was Born On Christmas Day), so the sight of Sarah Cracknell, Bob Stanley and Pete Wiggs releasing an album in December may cause fans of the festive single to go all a-flutter. Those expectations should be parked though. The Night is another of the trio’s explorations into ambient music (rumour has it that a more ‘poppy’ album is on the way next year), following up on 2021’s I’ve Been Trying To Tell You.

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‘The Night’ is billed as Saint Etienne's twelfth studio album, which may seem like a relatively paltry return for a band that will celebrate thirty-five years of activity next year by releasing a thirteenth in close succession. But these bald statistics, like 'The Night' itself, only tell part of the story. Saint Etienne, collectively and individually, is a much more expansive venture than a dozen albums and it is beyond the albums that the full story unravels in the films, the soundtracks, the fan club releases, the remixes, the DJing, the b-sides, the compilations, the books and other associated projects.

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A select number of bands that started life in the 1990s have kept making music, and kept getting better. The idea of a group as a lifetime commitment, band members growing and changing over decades alongside their audience, is a recent cultural concept. From the 1960s, bands either imploded early, or staggered on to diminishing returns. Later, they began reforming to cash in on nostalgia.

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