Idlewild were huge for me in the early noughties. The first thing I heard by them that I really liked was Little Discourage, the first single from their second (or third, depending on how you classify Captain) album 100 Broken Windows. This was around October 1999, so it was just after I’d arrived at university and was feeling a bit weird and lost. (Don’t worry, this feeling vanished after the first term and I spent the next two and a bit years having the absolute time of my life).
I’d sort-of liked what I’d heard of Idlewild on the Evening Session but I’d largely ignored them until Little Discourage came out and it clicked for me. I went out and bought Hope Is Important pretty much immediately (the new album didn’t come out until early 2000 and I couldn’t wait that long to hear more of them).
I very quickly grew to love it — it had the right balance of melody and noise and tempo and at 35 minutes long, didn’t outstay its welcome either. This album reminds me so much of late 1999 that when I hear it I can almost perfectly visualise the complete mess that was my student bedroom.
I’m going to save the rest of my gushing for Idlewild until we get to 100 Broken Windows, but to raise your anticipation levels I’ll just leave you with a photo of your somewhat ‘refreshed’ author expressing his love of the band via t-shirt.
I have absolutely no idea who the guy next to me is, but if anyone knows him, say hi from me.
