This is a featurette located by Hannah, and it appeared on German media
outlet ARD. As it was broadcast in that country, all of the band's
answers have been overdubbed with the German translation. Luckily for
us, we have fans who dip are able to deftly adapt between both English
and German and that's where we owe a big thank you to Laura. She
translated the whole thing, and if you don't speak the language then she
has you covered.
The talk is fairly downbeat, even for an Editors interview, but that's
not what makes this special. We've known for about a week that the band
have done acoustic versions of some of the new songs, and they've been
showing up on various radio stations in Europe. We've usually found
out just after the fact, so they keep getting missed. With that in mind,
this clip has an all too brief snippet of Heart Attack being played by
Tom on the acoustic guitar, so we now know that ARD has footage of the
band playing. When will it surface? That's the question. Our people are
on this...
One thing I would disagree with is Mr Smith's assertion that he "wanted to be a band that changes
people’s lives, which is naive and not really possible". I'm not to sure that's totally true, because I think it discounts the more minor but positive effects Editors' music has on people. If eagerly waiting for the pre-order of the band's new album to drop through the letterbox is an event that somebody has really been looking forward to, you've improved their week. If a person is feeling down and they stick on their favourite Editors track and it lifts their mood, something that was created out of nothing has altered a moment in their day. I know that what Tom's referring to is probably more about a question of scale, but I think that the smaller effects count as much as the bigger ones. Those little joys occur in complete strangers' lives because Editors wrote some songs, and that is a thing to be proud of.
TRANSLATION
Tom: Going back to Brexit, I find so much that I dislike about the UK
and things that I feel like I have nothing in common with.
Ben: It feels particularly crashed over here.
Tom: Yes, we are divided. There is a simmering tension and anger in a lot of people, the sheer amount of poverty and suffering you see just on the streets. People are really struggling.
Narrator: Karma Climb - a song about the indifference of hurting others as long as people thrive upwards.
Justin: I think we live in a reactionary society that has no time for understanding all the side effects and truths and understanding other people’s emotions. We live in a society which is attempting to be black and white, but people aren’t built that way. We need depth and reason and empathy in order to be happy.
Narrator: Editors are the outsiders amongst the big British bands, never been as successful as they deserved.
The title of the new record EBM stands for Electronic Body Music, a homage to the Eighties, where queer disco music was a political manifesto - A means for the fight of equality.
Ben: We are trying to extract as much emotion as possible out of one particular moment, as if you are pushed off the edge of emotion.
Tom: I think striving to achieve something that on the surface is accessible, but perhaps is saying something maybe dark or, something about it is unsettling, is a thrill.
Narrator: Dance like a monster with me - Tom Smith writes songs that carry [us] along, even when they deal with obscure, abysmal people. The video for the song Frankenstein dives deeply into the soul of a violent policeman.
Ed: I think there is a balance between the really expansive and the really claustrophobic.
Tom: The song to me has always been about people that enjoy the shadows or kind of darkness or, people who feel like outsiders.
Tom: I’s spend my mid to late teens in my bedroom with an acoustic guitar trying to write songs that sounded like R.E.M or Radiohead, tried to write songs that would connect with people on an emotional level. I wanted to say things like people are fragile - actually, these are pretty straight forward statements, but not exactly the type of thing you would really hear in music at the time.
Narrator: Their art is created in the offside, they come from Birmingham - not London. They studied at the musical university rather than at the art school. Taken the gloomy, urging from the new wave and enriched with their view of the human condition.
Tom: I wanted to be a band that changes people’s lives, which is naive and not really possible. But to be a band that means something to some people on an emotional level, a band whose lyrics people would get tattooed on themselves.
Narrator: Their songs encompass the whole human in their beauty and abominableness.
After a long break due to covid, they are touring in a world they do not really recognize.
Justin: How do we get back to normal? Well I don’t think normal exists anymore. We live in a time of populism that subverts democracy. You have populist governments popping up all over the world, we live with one currently, that’s been essentially ruining it for 12 years. You’ve got the Italian government, the Hungarian government… where does this end?
Ben: It feels particularly crashed over here.
Tom: Yes, we are divided. There is a simmering tension and anger in a lot of people, the sheer amount of poverty and suffering you see just on the streets. People are really struggling.
Narrator: Karma Climb - a song about the indifference of hurting others as long as people thrive upwards.
Justin: I think we live in a reactionary society that has no time for understanding all the side effects and truths and understanding other people’s emotions. We live in a society which is attempting to be black and white, but people aren’t built that way. We need depth and reason and empathy in order to be happy.
Narrator: Editors are the outsiders amongst the big British bands, never been as successful as they deserved.
The title of the new record EBM stands for Electronic Body Music, a homage to the Eighties, where queer disco music was a political manifesto - A means for the fight of equality.
Ben: We are trying to extract as much emotion as possible out of one particular moment, as if you are pushed off the edge of emotion.
Tom: I think striving to achieve something that on the surface is accessible, but perhaps is saying something maybe dark or, something about it is unsettling, is a thrill.
Narrator: Dance like a monster with me - Tom Smith writes songs that carry [us] along, even when they deal with obscure, abysmal people. The video for the song Frankenstein dives deeply into the soul of a violent policeman.
Ed: I think there is a balance between the really expansive and the really claustrophobic.
Tom: The song to me has always been about people that enjoy the shadows or kind of darkness or, people who feel like outsiders.
Tom: I’s spend my mid to late teens in my bedroom with an acoustic guitar trying to write songs that sounded like R.E.M or Radiohead, tried to write songs that would connect with people on an emotional level. I wanted to say things like people are fragile - actually, these are pretty straight forward statements, but not exactly the type of thing you would really hear in music at the time.
Narrator: Their art is created in the offside, they come from Birmingham - not London. They studied at the musical university rather than at the art school. Taken the gloomy, urging from the new wave and enriched with their view of the human condition.
Tom: I wanted to be a band that changes people’s lives, which is naive and not really possible. But to be a band that means something to some people on an emotional level, a band whose lyrics people would get tattooed on themselves.
Narrator: Their songs encompass the whole human in their beauty and abominableness.
After a long break due to covid, they are touring in a world they do not really recognize.
Justin: How do we get back to normal? Well I don’t think normal exists anymore. We live in a time of populism that subverts democracy. You have populist governments popping up all over the world, we live with one currently, that’s been essentially ruining it for 12 years. You’ve got the Italian government, the Hungarian government… where does this end?
