Courtesy of Strefa Music Art here's a fraction of Tom, Justin and Elliott being interviewed on the day they did a signing session for Empik in Warsaw Poland 4th November 2019. Although it's not the complete event, it has the distinction of being the single most informative interview so far of this entire Black Gold campaign. Even more unusual is that most of the gold in these hills is offered up with the minimal amount of prompting from their interrogator.
Imagine an alternate scenario where you approach the band with these questions:-
"Why did you explore electronics for ITLAOTE and, just between us, what was Chris really like around that time?"
"How much did you get paid to sign to Kitchenware?"
"How many songs did you really have ready as possible contenders for the Jacknife Lee sessions?"
"Specifically, who were the Snowfield Demos made for?"
At least two of those questions would probably be stonewalled outright, and yet on this occasion each one of them is answered as a result of a loosely related question being posed and simply letting them speak. It's amazing what is revealed.
Tom makes a very interesting statement at around two and a half minutes into this video, namely that they had 4 tracks going into the Jacknife Lee sessions. This confirmation of a fourth song is great because it means that there's an unaccounted Editors song that we've yet to hear! On the flip side, it's terrible because it means....there's an unaccounted Editors song that we've yet to hear. What stage of development it's in is of course unclear, but it now joins that lost batallion of compositions that we know exists but have yet to hear (Dream Dark as Your Heaven, He Comes from the Quiet and The Wind on the Water being some others). We're keeping lists and notes, so this kind of thing won't be forgotten easily.
The Snowfield demos were done for Island Records and I am so glad they didn't get picked up by a major label that early. The music industry at that level seems to me to be a profit-driven macerator, existing to ruthlessly exploit talent for maximum returns and then disposing of it brutally and efficiently when it stops generating cash. I certainly don't believe for a minute that they would have gotten away with making In This Light and on This Evening on Island, given the success of their first two guitar-heavy records. If they had, I believe they probably would have been dropped shortly after for not attaining the sales levels set by The Back Room and An End Has a Start. Considering how many of their peers at the time they came through have disbanded, it speaks to Editors' decision making abilities that they chose the path they're on with Kitchenware and then PIAS.
I only wish we had the rest of this interview to see what else was said. Given their apparent openness I guarantee that right at the end they probably decided to play a couple of tracks from the abandoned Flood sessions for album 4, just as a treat for the Polish fans in attendance. Enjoy the revelations ;)
brought to you with lots and lots of lemming-love ;) x
