Ed has broken the Editors No Tattoo Code that all original members used to abide by...by having a tattoo! Heresy!
Before we begin, shout-out of the month goes to Mr Nic Willes, who took to the drum stool mid-tour for Slowdive after Simon had a loss in the family. You look up "versatility" in the dictionary, there's a link to Nic's Instagram profile. What a guy. Sadly, it put an end to any speculation that Editors were going to be moving closer to becoming a 7-piece goth version of Earth Wind and Fire on this tour with him on guitar again. On the plus side, he did fulfil my long held dream of an Editors/Slowdive crossover.
When you're addressing a band's current era of development the word "established" can often be used in a pejorative way, as if somehow all the hard work to achieve success is done and only the certainty of future irrelevance is now assured. They made it! There is, however, another kind of "established" that has far more positive inferences, a kind that Editors are experiencing as they make their way across the country.
Their UK mini-tour began on the 26th of February in Newcastle, and as all you amateur historians will remember, this was the city where their first label Kitchenware was based. There are only 6 nights on this run of engagements, and a number of them are sold out. Considering how long they've been doing this, you would think that's going to be a given, but it's actually happened in spite of a drought of publicity surrounding these dates. If you knew where to look, then you knew they were coming. Instead of billboards and posters on the underground, this latest success has been through fan-loyalty, word of mouth and most importantly the one thing you can't buy but have to earn; reputation. It's taken 20 years of very hard work to craft it, but we are now in a time where they can announce a tour in their home country, albeit quietly, and people will still show up to see them play.
I remember Elliott saying in a 2022 interview that Editors are a band with a identity crisis, and the way different countries react when they tour only seems to reinforce that assessment. In the UK they appear to have been allocated the status of "cult band", carving out their own piece of longevity contrary to the fleeting nature of music business attention. Move across the North Sea to mainland Europe, however, and Editors are a band that sell out large venues and have fostered a ferociously dedicated fan base. They seem to become a different group depending on the location they're in at any given time, suggesting that their identity is in fact a fluid, changeable commodity.
"Every little piece of your life, it means something to someone..."
One thing I've noticed from various footage and photos posted is that Blanck Mass isn't present. There's been no official announcement that he's left so I guess we can assume for now that he's still an Editor? There was also an curious quote from Russell in an interview with Stereoboard published last month:-
I don’t know where we’ll go next, though, because we haven’t started writing or anything, so next year is the time to do that. Once you get the desire, once you get the hunger for it, then things start rolling.
This illustrates the malleable nature of being in Editors in 2024. I say that because as recently as 2022, Russell mentioned impending plans to return to Mexico and that the band already had some demos floating around. The current published tour schedule (which you can always view at the band's reliably excellent online forum run by Hannah), coupled with the above statement from Stereoboard, seems to indicate that neither of those things are in play any more. On face value, it would also seem to imply that 2024 is going to be about winding down the EBM promotional cycle in preparation for album 8?
For now, get on out there and see the band play as they continue to make their way towards the festival season 2024.
Editors Instagram - February 2024
For all of Editors' previous Instagram posts, go here.
brought to you with lots and lots of lemming-love :) x
