When The Back Room was released on the Fader label over in the States, the lead single was Munich and in this post you can check out 2 performances of the track on American television. There's a 5 month gap between the shows and there's definitely a subtle difference there. On the O'Brien show, the band seem to be quite tense and constrained when they're performing. There's a certain nervousness, and a slight rigidity in the song delivery. It being an early appearance on American TV was no doubt a contributing factor, as were the nerves that probably accompanied it. They seem to be be holding the song very tightly, if that makes any sense?
On the Craig Ferguson show, however, it's like they've played the song live so many times by that point that they're free from having to worry about keeping it together, and are more able to relax a little while playing. The strange thing is that both of these scenarios are equally compelling if you're in the audience; knowing that a band is hyper-tense and could screw it up at any moment can be an exhilarating experience. But conversely, a band that are well and truly road-tested as far as playing the songs goes are freed-up to interact with their audience more.
When Papillon made its live debut prior to ITLAOTE being released, for example, it was new and weird and it seemed like the band had to spend time getting a feel for it. Tom spent a lot of time pacing the stage in small circles and concentrating on his singing. And as audience members, Editors fans were still getting used to the song (and spending obscene amounts of time on certain message boards trying to piece together the lyrics!). It felt a little bit odd. Fast forward to the end stages of their last proper tour and they had pyrotechnics during Papillon, and Tom almost climbing over his keyboard to encourage the crowd. It had become one of the high points of the live set and a song that everyone looked forward to hearing and going totally nuts to.
Anyway, enough of my waffling and theorising, on with the videos. Check them out:-
Conan - stream it here
Ferguson - stream it here
brought to you with lots and lots of lemming-love :) x
