Editors, The Institute, Birmingham

Supported by Swim Deep & Victories at Sea

I'm in Birmingham tonight where the Editors have announced their only UK date of this year. Well that was until they announced another one, the day before. Already I feel a little bit cheated.

It’s my first time at the HMV Institute in Birmingham. I like it. It’s a nice tight little venue which looks like an ornate old theatre but was actually built as a Methodist congregational chapel. Sort of appropriate for the locals who have come to worship Tom Smith and co.

First though, a couple of support bands and it’s good to see that the Editors have kept these local.

Swim Deep apparently make ‘sun kissed noise’, so their Facebook says. Well perhaps grunge kissed and as if to emphasise the point the singer is in his Nirvana t-shirt. Meanwhile the bass player appears to have pyjama bottoms on. Must be students.

They make a nice racquet though, although perhaps too much keyboard, at one point I thought they’d got Jean Michel Jarre there on the ivories. The overall effect is not unlike early Editors at times. So on safe ground then and oh he can spit wine upwards over himself. Yeah, must be students.

What can you tell from a band’s t-shirts? Well now we have support band number two and a Sonic Youth number adorns their bass player. This is Victories at Sea, who open with some frenetic drumming and a mostly instrumental number which is actually pretty epic. Then the bass player goes on the keyboards, then the drummer goes on keyboards and in his place we get a drum machine, then the drum machine goes on keyboards... only kidding. In between the musical chairs they make almost gothic soundscapes but their songs have a bit of everything, which means they sound like everybody and yet nobody.

Sadly they did slide a bit into the ordinary after a very promising start but certainly a band to watch out for. Not only that but they were handing out 200 free CDs at the end with unique Polaroids on each. Nice lads all round. Sadly such was the scrum for these that I didn't get one.

As tonight's gig was primarily marketed to the fan base I was sort of expecting something a bit different from the Editors but that’s not really what we get. True we get four new tracks but two of those ‘The Sting’ and ‘Two Hearted Spider’, part of the encore here, have been around for a year or more. The other two ‘Sugar’ and ‘Nothing’ bookend the set.

‘Sugar’ is a dramatic and an intimate way to start with Tom Smith at the piano delivering a brooding song that shows that whatever is new about the Editors it will still include a good dose of darkness. The piano continues with the unmistakable introduction to 'Racing Rats'.

This starts a bit of a crowd pleasing run through of the hits, which as part of the point of these gigs is to warm up for a couple of foreign festival dates is understandable but I expected a bit more tonight.

New guitarist syndrome I guess. The old chestnut of musical differences has seen off former lead guitarist, keyboardist, eye candy (so I’m told) and possible driving force Chris Urbanowicz. How important he was to them will, I guess, become clearer in time. One compliment paid to him tonight is that it takes not one but two people to replace him. Tonight the Editors are a five piece.

Perhaps I’m being a bit over critical about the set. We do get the not often played ‘Fall’ which is massive. Beautiful. ‘You Are Fading’ goes down a storm and a new version of ‘The Weight Of The World’ equally so, literally sending shivers down your spine. Otherwise it’s a set a bit short on surprises for saying it was a homecoming one off. Well, two off and the main set is exactly the same both nights.

There are also new versions of some songs, perhaps out of necessity. ‘All Sparks’ for one has been given a right spanking. In fact Tom introduces it as a ‘new song with an outrageous bass solo from Russell’. Hmmm, not sure what I think to that, so moving on quickly to the always outrageous ‘Eat Raw Meat = Blood Drool’.

Performance wise you can’t fault them and they are clearly loving it, we get repeated thumbs up from the band, which is better than a thumbs down obviously but I do wish they’d shift Tom’s piano to the side and some of their other mountain of kit while they’re at it. There’s a drummer in there somewhere fighting to get out.

They leave us with nothing, the previously mentioned ‘Nothing’, the most immediately impressive of the new ones. Then as they leave the stage we discover that none of them can manage to flick a guitar pick as far as the front row. Lightweights. The bouncers have to scrape them up off the floor and hand them out.

The encore starts quietly as Tom returns alone for his Twilight moment and ‘No Sound But The Wind’. Then ‘In This Light...’ builds things up further before ‘Munich’ blows everyone away, only for the newbie ‘Two Hearted Spider’ to make things feel perhaps a bit overblown.

But then as the closing and reworked ‘Papillon’ demonstrates, the Editors are still very good, still have their great energy but yet they’re now sort of different. Time will tell if this is progress.

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Kings Of Leon, Nottingham Arena

I would like to offer some quip that the M83 runs from Kilmarnock to East Kilbride (or some other equally obscure locations) but it does not. I would also like to say what an uninteresting straight road with little distractions it is, but I'm not even sure there is an M83 motorway at all. There is however, a band, who could be very like that fictional road.

They take the stage just as we arrive at Nottingham's Ice Arena, the place feeling every bit like an ice rink tonight. It's around zero outside and probably colder inside. Anthony Gonzalez seems to agree; he keeps his scarf and coat on for a least the first half of M83's 45 minutes set. They make a promising start with a powerful opening with a lively instrumental track but there after it all sounds a bit samey. M83 are a French electronica band who were once a duo but now consist of just Gonzalez together with session musicians. Tonight there's a guitarist, a drummer, Gonzalez on keyboards and also the keyboards of his female companion, with whom he shares vocal duty. He keeps her in her place, sideways to us, so that we can't even see her face. He describes his music as something from the shoegazing genre but I don't see that, shoegazing was all guitar. Anyhow, his music is more 80's than 90's, I think secretly he wants to be Jean Michel Jarre.

Despite the obvious musical talent up on stage, for the uninitiated, which must be at least 99% of the audience tonight, it's easy to get lost, overpowered and with many songs blurring into one another, well bored really. Sorry.

It appears that the bigger a band gets the more roadies they acquire. Kings Of Leon have so many, that they don't know what to do with themselves. I mean the bands equipment still consists of just three guitars and a drum kit. How hard can it be to set that lot up? Thankfully there's all the lights to fiddle with and luckily one bank of lighting isn't working, so they can all cluster around that and give it a good prod.

The Followill boys take the stage to the sound of Mozart’s Requiem (apparently, I'm no expert), until this is replaced by the haunting guitar sound that is the opening of 'Closer', which echoes out across the arena. Game on. A good entrance and they follow the sequence of their latest album, 'Only By the Night', with the heavy bass of 'Crawl'.

The Kings blasted through four or five songs before anything is said to the crowd. Nothing unusual there, the band never have been much for that sort of thing. When they're up there on stage, they spend their time playing music. Nothing wrong there, playing music is what they do best.

That said, Caleb, a man of few words, was positively chatty tonight... 'Hi, we are Kings of Leon'. I look around but I can't see anyone cursing, 'Damn, get your coat love, we're a week early for the Stereophonics'. Caleb mate, that's why we're here.



The three brothers and their first cousin from Tennessee are on fine form tonight, despite the rumours that they're not speaking to each other. Families eh! Named 'Kings Of Leon' because their father and grandfather are both called Leon. Bless. How nice to have dynamic offspring.

It's a pretty good crowd tonight, involved but not too raucous. The beer throwing that often blights the Arena is happily absent tonight.

Caleb urges the crowd to sing along as the intro to their number one single, the wonderfully seductive 'Sex on Fire' rings out. It's interesting to watch his facial expressions; we're close enough to the front to do so, as he sings some of his more dubious lines. I notice his eyebrows go up on each double entendre.



The light show is impressive, although fairly incidental and I assume is to keep those at the back of the hall, who can't see the band, amused.

He announces they are going to perform 'a few songs we haven't played in a long time' and introduces an oldie, delighting and confusing the crowd in equal measure as he throws in 'Joe's Head' from their debut album.

As ever the Arena made it sound like they were playing into a bucket at times. If only they'd put a proper ceiling on it, then we'd have something called acoustics. Whilst their newer stuff is undoubtedly designed for such cavernous arenas and festivals, some of the older stuff sounds a bit thin. 'Molly's Chambers' for instance sounds a little bit tamer each time I hear it.

There were plenty of highlights though as the band rummaged into the recesses of all four of their albums. 'Cold Desert' is suitably poignant and 'On Call' suitably brooding. 'The Bucket' goes un-dedicated to the Arena sound system while 'Milk' is just plain terrific and also quite a sing-along, as is current single 'Use Somebody'. This had the audience waving their mobile phones in the air like cigarette lighters. Oh for an air rifle.

Caleb gave everything into every single note of every single song, whilst the rest of the band simply get on with their jobs and did them well.

Caleb's back chatting, being almost humble or well oiled, and repeatedly thanking the crowd for making them bigger than they ever thought they would be. He did seem to genuinely mean it and appeared truly grateful to be up there in front of everyone. Also apologising for playing such a mammoth set. The Kings are certainly value for money tonight.



There's a hint of tension when Jared seems to lay down his bass after 'Slow Night, So Long' or perhaps he's just knackered, this was song number 22 but Caleb talks him into one more. Confounding/delighting (delete as applicable) everyone again by closing with the wonderful 'Trani'. After which Jared seemed to storm off stage whilst the rest of the band milked the applause.

There were no less than five tracks from 'Youth & Young Manhood' tonight, other bands please take note, sending me home a very happy bunny by playing both 'Wasted Time' and 'California Waiting'.

After the marathon main set, the band come back for an encore and a long one naturally. Well it's going to be when it opens with the epic seven minutes that is 'Knocked Up'. As 'Manhattan' is played, I can see several people in the seats, itching towards the exits, desperate to be first out of the car park but not wanting to miss anything. Caleb won't be rushed and screams out 'Charmer'. Pure quality. Time for one more? No one got any kids or baby sitters to get back to then? No? Good. Here's 'Black Thumbnail'. After which the three other band members grab Caleb by the hair and drag him screaming from the stage... no not really. 'We are King Of Leon. Goodnight'. Excellent.

Hang on, Caleb, come back a sec, my partner wants 'Notion'. Someone’s always going to leave without hearing their favourite song and tonight she's with me, but with their long set they made a good attempt at minimising that. Ok if I'm being picky where was 'Red Morning Light' and for that matter, 'Taper Jean Girl'. So that's 30 songs next time, if that's ok with you boys.

They played for a total of two hours. Can a band play too long? Possibly and I'm certainly a fan of short and punchy but I can't really find fault tonight. Although... and I know I say this every time I'm arena-ised but I'll say it again. How good would they have been in more intimate surroundings? Where Caleb could have screeched to his hearts content without all that effort disappearing up the air conditioning. It'll never happen now of course, now that they have their fame and can pull crowds as big as this but wouldn't it nice.

All photos thanks to Jade Skellington

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