I see this song as being both about Isobel leaving Stuart and about leaving Belle & Sebastian (in, at that time, a purely spiritual sense, since it would be another few months before her actual physical departure). "Because you move in circles of the brave / Where art defines their lives," "I only wanted her to see / The beauty of the world surrounding her / But when she opened up her eyes / It's much too late..." and "She grew up and she left the rest of us" [note the plural] really make me think the romantic and career issues are just all tangled up here. It seems that he's saying that she's saying she's grown, she's changed, she's a different person and a different musician from who she was when the band was founded, and she's ready to try new things, move on with her life -- without him, and without B&S. And that is why this might just be their finest song; so much meaning and emotion (and instrumentation!) packed into a little under 4 minutes.
And, yep, Isobel's "Monologue for an Old True Love" is very much a response to this -- it includes the lines "Talking so self-righteously / About everything you showed me, boy" and "Say you're angry now / I wonder why / You've got them round your little finger." I suspect she realized IWUtU's popularity...
I see this song as being both about Isobel leaving Stuart and about leaving Belle & Sebastian (in, at that time, a purely spiritual sense, since it would be another few months before her actual physical departure). "Because you move in circles of the brave / Where art defines their lives," "I only wanted her to see / The beauty of the world surrounding her / But when she opened up her eyes / It's much too late..." and "She grew up and she left the rest of us" [note the plural] really make me think the romantic and career issues are just all tangled up here. It seems that he's saying that she's saying she's grown, she's changed, she's a different person and a different musician from who she was when the band was founded, and she's ready to try new things, move on with her life -- without him, and without B&S. And that is why this might just be their finest song; so much meaning and emotion (and instrumentation!) packed into a little under 4 minutes.
And, yep, Isobel's "Monologue for an Old True Love" is very much a response to this -- it includes the lines "Talking so self-righteously / About everything you showed me, boy" and "Say you're angry now / I wonder why / You've got them round your little finger." I suspect she realized IWUtU's popularity...