Toronto – As you might have known from my previous post, I was at the Antlers/Editors show on Tuesday. This post is about the main event of the night, England’s The Editors, who are in town to promote their latest and drastically different sounding third album – In This Light and on This Evening. It appears some of the older fans of the more guitar driven music are having an allergic reaction to the newer more synthy sounds of the third album, despite it’s equally bleak outlook on everything. So it was definitely an interesting mix of people at the Phoenix on Tuesday.
Coming to the stage around 10:40, the band instantly let the crowd know that this night was definitely going to be a night of new and old material with an opening trio of In This Light and On This Evening, Lights and An End Has a Start. The rest of the night would feature most of the songs from the third album (mild response) interspersed with songs from the first two albums (great response).
As a live act, the Editors are quite engaging, almost completely due to lead singer Tom Smith’s theatrics. There are bands where the singers sing their songs nicely, there are bands where singers look disinterested, then there are bands where the singers sing their songs as if every word they have written are the most most important piece of literature since Shakespeare. The Editors are in the latter group. Tom Smith is quite the showman – between switching seamlessly from piano to guitar to synth, the man does everything in his power possible – poses, hand guesturing, kneeling, looking directly at the crowd – to let you know that his songs are important. Hard not to semi admire a man whose that committed to his craft. As Chromewaves noted, this show wouldn’t of been nearly as good if it wasn’t for Tom Smith’s presence/showmanship.
Overall, the new material was pretty solid live, not sounding too different then that on the album, however, I would have to say that the Editors insistence on pretty much playing the entire album might have dragged the concert into ‘too long’ territory. The classic Editors songs like Munich, Lights and Smokers Outside The Hospital Doors were great and an instant hit with the people were happy. I am sure Papillon will elicit the same response in time.
*Approximate Set List
In This Light And On This Evening
Lights
An End Has A Start
You Don’t Know Love
Bullets
The Boxer
The Big Exit
Blood
Eat Raw Meat = Blood Drool
The Racing Rats
Escape The Nest
Like Treasure
Bones
Smokers Outside The Hospital Doors
Bricks And Mortar
Encore:
Walk The Fleet Road
Munich
Papillon
Fingers In The Factories