oundtracks aren’t usually known for their surprising cohesiveness, at their best they serve as a sort of audio postcard for a movie, like Saturday Night Fever or The Breakfast Club. They provide the catchy songs, which hopefully encapsulate the experience of watching the movie. I have not seen Todd Solondz’ movie Storytelling, nor do I plan to see it, but once I heard that Belle and Sebastian was contributing the soundtrack, I had to pick it up. Like many soundtracks, this one melds incidental music (music that occurs in the background while something is happening), pop songs, and dialogue from the film to give us a good picture of what the movie is like.

The incidental music is dreadfully boring. Songs like "Fiction" and "Night Walk" have nothing to contribute. I have to hope they are playing in the background while something terribly interesting is going on, because this type of full-band noodling doesn’t serve to further anything, it is static, dull, and tired. The piano plays here, here are the strings, and there’s the trusty guitar, plunking away in the background. It all seems hastily put together and poorly thought out. Imagine the most boring thing Belle and Sebastian have ever done, got it? Now multiply that feeling of sorrow times ten. There’s the incidental music.

The dialogue is pretty dull, as well. I suppose it could be indicative of the dullness of the characters, as if a movie would warrant this kind of dullness padding. The clip "Conan, Early Letterman" introduces a male character talking about his prospects. "...I wanna be on TV, maybe have a talk show or something, like Conan or early Letterman." What is this? It isn’t funny; it isn’t that tragic or hopeful, it just seems lame. Other pieces aim a bit higher; "Class Rank" is at least briefly humorous in its sick portrayal of caste jumping.

There are a few gems on the album. Of the six pop songs included here, two are very good. "Storytelling" is a breezy little tune, sung by Isobel Campbell. It has just the right amount of bounce in the piano and not too much Sarah Records in the vocal delivery, it works out all very well. "Big John Shaft" is Belle and Sebastian trying out the ultra-white funk and succeeding quite admirably. For a lot of people, these two songs will make the record worth purchase—I’d say wait for some sort of Belle and Sebastian compilation.

Overall, Storytelling is a bad soundtrack. The songs don’t work together to paint a picture of the film, unless the film is similarly watery and all over the place, in which case—mission accomplished. The songs, for the most part, aren’t very good, and they don’t endear me to the film at all.