Radio 1 Big Weekend - May 10th 2008 (audio/video)

Up next is another indicator of future festival greatness from a band who were very much into their stride in terms of performing AEHAS live. The set has all the intricacies we've come to love from Editors; great songs, great playing and an energetic singer who has a tendency to lose himself in the moment and, just occasionally, lose the plot every once in a while. Whether he was climbing the piano, running around the stage or using Smokers as a cover to try and remove a wig that poor Ed wasn't actually wearing (see photo below), Mr Smith really was on fine form for this show. Both vocally and the extent to which he actually threw himself into delivering these songs, displaying a reckless intensity that we probably won't see any more. Age and the awareness that falling over on stage really, really hurts were no doubt motivations to ease up and take things a little more carefully.

It won't come off...

By way of bonus materials I'm including:-

• All the photos from the Big Weekend website
• An interview between Colin Murray, Russell and Tom
• An interview between Tom and Chris and a guy whose name escapes me
• The full unedited interview Tom did with Zane Lowe and Edith for the BBC 
• A 50 second audio introduction to the radio highlights show done by Ed and Russell.

The main selling point here however is still the music, as it always is with Editors, and songs that never get played any more like When Anger Shows demonstrate that the current lineup has such a solid foundation underneath them in terms of their ongoing legacy. Their continuing, deserved successes were all formed on these stages and in front of these audiences with these compositions. Also, remember that before the pick-and-choose nature of the digital era the second album was often the point where bands completely lost it, having blown all their best work on the debut and the b-sides for singles. Not so in this instance. A treat from the AEHAS campaign, and one that I'm really excited to make available again in full. Enjoy the music ;)

Video - stream it here

MP3s
Bones - download here
Racing Rats - download here
AEHAS - download here
All Sparks - download here
Escape the Nest - download here
WOTW - download here
Bullets - download here
Munich - download here
When Anger Shows - download here
Fingers - download here
Smokers - download here

Bonus Materials
Big Weekend Photos
      

MP3 of Russell and Ed introducing the radio coverage
download here

Interviews included in the video

I have to confess that I cannot for the life of me remember the name of the gentleman interviewing Tom and Chris in clip number 1. I think he was a Radio 1 DJ at the time of the show but I can't place him. He conducts a brief 2 minute Q&A with the guys, allowing the Urbanowicz wit to surface one more time. Fun stuff.

Interview 2 is Tom, Russell (not "Russ") and Colin Murray.

And last up, this interview is between Tom, Zane Lowe and Edith Bowman. There's a version of this on youtube that runs at just over a minute, but this one is the full unedited version and is about 3 minutes longer. The price you pay for the extra banter? Slightly ropey picture quality. It is from 2008 after all, a simpler time, and things were much different then (and visually they looked like a pile of bollocks). Ah-ha, you'll say. If we can get the gig in decent quality and that was from the same time, why is this so shoddy? Well, that's an easy explanation, but the word limit on Blogspot is such that I couldn't possibly do it justice by condensing it to fit those boundaries.

(cough, cough)

Even though the image isn't pristine, something is very clear here. I'm pretty good with body language and I have to say, there's definitely some chemistry between that singer and the Scottish DJ lady. They should hook up, it's a surefire love thing I tells ya. 

brought to you with lots and lots of lemming-love :) x