Did I already tell you what fucking torture high school was for me?

Fuck you very much class of '89.

I had engineered a last semester that was a double block of Humanities, then T.A.-ing for my french teacher. As she didn't really need me, and knew about the punishment I took at the hands of other students, she would let me arrive late, but mark me as "Present" on attendance anyways. Many days I wouldn't arrive at school until 10:30 and would be gone by 2 in the afternoon.

The reason I was allowed to have such a slack ending to my high school career, was a trip to Europe with my Episcopal Church priest to help him with his doctorate studies work at Oxford University. What school wouldn't jump at the idea of one of their students having that kind of oppurtunity?

Little did they know that the real reason my priest was going was so he could travel around Europe fucking hustlers and old friends under the guise of giving a young student from a small town the "Grande Tour" made famous in literature of yore.

After a brief stop-over in London, off we went to the south of France, where I: partied with tax-hating ex-pat Brits, with whom I would sneak over the Spanish border to buy cheap gin to stow back to the small Basque village I was staying in; stayed with members of the Le National Front and inadvertantly almost got myself kicked out of France by poster-ing the downtown of a small village with far-right propaganda in the middle of the night; and got wrapped up into the middle of a feud between opposing families on different hills on either side of the village.

On to Greece, where I learned to chain smoke cheap turkish cigs, stayed in the Grande Bretagne Hotel and flirted with hustlers that used Syntagma Square as a street corner waving to our balcony from the park, eventually culminating in the priest fucking a guy in the bathroom, while I, very homesick and weary of the priest's shenanigans, had a phone conversation with my parents next door in the living room.

My travels with the priest ended in London. He went on to Oxford, then home, and I, finally relieved of the stress of hiding his secret life, was left with a nice family in south London's Dulwich neigborhood, who's crazy son and neighbors proceeded to introduce me to the nascent arrival of the rave and Brit-pop scene.

The son in the family was a young man named Jeremy Deller. From the moment I met him, Jeremy took me under his wing, seeing that he had a visitor to his time and place that was completely wet behind the ears when it came to big city life. Jeremy was getting ready his first ever gallery show, giant photographs he'd taken from the television of famous british vaudeville actors that no young American had ever heard of before. Jeremy wore dapper suits and had a collection of neck ties that literally fell out of the tiny attic bedroom of his parents house.

So many "firsts" during that stay in London. First true shephards pie, first time I ever got so drunk I puked (thanks to Hungarian wine and a diet of peanuts and raisins at Jeremy's opening), first time to Heaven (the historic london nightclub), first true rave, first time in a gay bar, seeing the Queen, ....

Most importantly, though was the first time I ever was alone in a big city, left to wander in and out of record stores and galleries, museums and corner shops, without having anybody waiting on me or pulling my sleeve to leave.

When I finally arrived back to the disappointments of small town Washington, I shared every bit of information I gleaned over those months with my friends, introducing them to indie bands like The Pooh Sticks, My Bloody Valentine, Primal Scream, The Pastels, The Mighty Lemon Drops and Soup Dragons and house music from Chicago and Detroit via London and those parties at Heaven and the Brixton Academy.

Fast forward two years. I was now working for a small indie record store in Spokane and was beginning to find some of the bands I'd come home with 2 years earlier pop up with albums in America. I had just purchased a giant stereo system for my bedroom, and was busy stealing all the promo CD's I could get my hands on of British Indie music, House music, and "Indie House" (think Primal Scream's Screamadelica, Soup Dragon's "I'm Free", Candy Flip's "Strawberry Fields Forever"). The store was well glad for me to be taking these CD's home as Grunge was creating a giant piss-stain over here, and they had no time for twee british pop.

One day a CD that would literally change the way I thought about music, the way the world would think about music, fell into my lap.

Saint Etienne's Fox Base Alpha.

From the moment the album starts, with the audio snippet of French television announcing "France Football: Saint Etienne" leading into the opening piano line of "Only Love Can Break Your Heart" the listener knows something very different, unique and compelling is about to happen.

Awash in tons of reverb, snippets from old movies and powerful deep dubby bass lines, the album is essentially the most british thing I'd every heard; accents out front, references to areas of London, and the "sounds" of older british music were referenced all over it. It blew my mind, and in retrospect signals for me the true end of the eighties and beginning of the 90's as well as the invasion of Brit-pop that would come by the end of the decade.

It would be an understatement to say I love this album. I have easily listened to Fox Bas Alpha hundreds of times and know the album by heart.

Three years later on my first truly solo trip to Europe I would go back to London and start what would then become ever growing tours of Saint Etienne's London. Every trip since has included trips to far-flung streets, neighborhoods and tube stops: Angel, Camden Town, Shad Thames, Croyden, Mario's Cafe.... Plane flights to London invariably force me to listen through Fox Bas Alpha and So Tough (Saint Etienne's sophomore outing) to put me in the mood to "Lose yourself in London!" I was even lucky enough to interview lead singer Sarah Cracknell during the media blitz surrounding the release of Good Humor (on Sub Pop even!) for The Stranger on one trip over.

Now, much to my delight the album has been re-released in two different ways. The first is an amazing Deluxe Edition double CD. The original remastered, and a bonus CD of out-takes, unreleased tracks and b-sides.

The second and more compelling re-issue of the album is titled Fox Base Beta. Saint Etienne has given all the original master tapes and computer diskettes to producer Richard X (Annie, Roisin Murphy, M.I.A., Sugababes... ). When I first found out about this project I wasn't too sure how things would pan out. I'm not a huge fan of Richard X's pop/dance production work, often I find it a bit too sterile.

"Only Love Can Break Your Heart" is given a little extra lift with stuttering piano lines and a more driving bass beat and some disco hand claps. "Girl VII" is made more lovely by some fancy Balearic guitar work and re-recorded vocals. The super heavy dubbiness of "Carnt Sleep" is intesified, and the build of the rave up "Stoned To Say The Least" comes on beautifully.

I don't want to give too much away, but there are some huge aural surprises to be found on Beta. I used to get a little bored by the second half of Fox Base Alpha, but now it's been so transformed as to be the most interesting part. On the anthemic "Like A Swallow" one singular change in the song actually brought out a gasp and tears to my eyes.

Yes. It is that good.

Released as a limited edition of 3000 and a bit hard to find this is well worth being in any brit-o-philes collection and snuggled up next to the original it can definitely hold its own weight.

Thank god for London. Thank god for that nascent new found freedom 20 years ago. Thank god Saint Etienne had the idea and tenacity to re-imagine one of the most perfect albums in recent history.