Editors - Guitar music for dark souls

The very moment I walk into the Rolling Stone, the Editors' management grabs me and starts pulling me along: "Oh Magda, there you are. Come on, hurry up, Ed is free right now." In less than a second I find myself sitting next to Ed Lay, while trying to take off my coat, find my recorder and the notebook with my questions, all strictly at the same time. The notebook is the first thing to emerge from my bag, and while I try to carry out the other two tasks as well, Ed picks up the notebook to examine one of the stickers I've stuck on it: the Editors one. "Did you make this?" "Nnnooo... I got it at the show you played here a couple of months ago." "Are you telling me that... we have stickers?!"

How long have you been on tour now?

This year we've only just started up again. We played a week in Europe, but before that we spent a week and a half in the United States, and it was thrilling, because it was our first American experience.

We're glad to be playing live again. Last year we played so many shows that having a bit of rest was a relief: it was starting to become exhausting.

We're really excited to be playing live again, it's rejuvenating. Every show we've played so far - both in Europe and the United States - has gone great.

How do you manage not to get bored playing the same songs every single night for such a long stretch? Do you rearrange the songs from time to time?

No. There have been times when we thought about how a song would come out if we played it slightly differently, we tried it and we changed it.

It's hard to play the same way all the time, but it's amazing how the audience reacts, and that's always really important. The audience is the real show.

Doesn't it really bore you to play the same song every night?

(Smiles) No, not at the moment.

You know, it can be tough if you're feeling a bit down, but right now our record has started selling well again in England, and that definitely helps. At the moment we're all very happy.

Right, let's talk a bit about the charts: your debut single, "Bullets", sold out in just two days. Since then you've become increasingly well known. Over the past year, have you had time to realise what was happening to you, or has it happened so fast that it still feels like a surprise?

...It was only 2000 copies, but that was also 2000 people who rushed out to buy the record... at that point we thought we were really capable of doing something, of doing something more or less significant.

I think the way the record has sold since then is incredible, unique: it came out, did fairly well, but then it disappeared from the charts straight after — people were still buying it, but not that many — and then it suddenly came back into the top ten about six months after release. I think that's a rare thing...

I don't think we realised how much our fanbase had grown, but it's definitely grown a lot over the last couple of months. At least in the UK.

Word has it that some major labels were interested in you. Why did you choose to sign with such a small label as Kitchenware?

It's funny because so many people ask the same question, and (smiles) I honestly don't remember that many majors being interested. There were a few bigger labels interested in our songs, but we were won over by the way Paul and Keith worked at Kitchenware: they believed in our songs, and the path they had in mind for the band matched what we wanted. Plus, we'd be their only priority: we wouldn't have to compete with other bands for attention, money or promotion...

(His mobile phone rings and Ed declines the call...)

Sorry about that.

So, at the time, you didn't think that with a bigger label you could have achieved greater success?

I don't think so, I don't think we expected to achieve any kind of success. Everyone was working really hard, and that effort paid off. I don't think we ever worried about the future: we recorded our record, and that was what mattered most — recording the record and being able to release it. Really, there's very little you can do beyond that. No, we weren't worried.

You're all very young - what's the average age of the band, around 22?

We're 24.

I know I'm incredibly young, but I promise you I'm growing up (Laughs).

But how is it possible that 80s music has such a strong influence on such young people?

I don't think the 80s influence us in particular: it's good music from any era and background that influences us. Time moves in circles: trends always come back around, and I think our music draws good ideas from different genres put forward in different eras. I don't think the 80s influenced us especially. I know there were bands that had a huge impact on people's lives, and I imagine our sound is similar to theirs because we play "guitar music" and it's the same instruments. I suppose people are reminded of certain bands because maybe we're revisiting certain things they did back then, but I hope we're doing it in our own way.

Editors formed in Stafford (you met at university), before moving to Birmingham. Why Birmingham instead of London?

There are a couple of reasons: the boring reason is that our managers live there, so this way we could be close to them. To be honest, I think that was the main reason. It's tempting to think about moving to London, of course, and of course we considered it.

Actually, Birmingham helped us a lot to stay out of the trends, it kept us away from other bands that were forming, which would have made us influence each other too much. It let us "isolate ourselves" and create exactly what we wanted without any pressure, and I'm convinced that was a very important part of our growth, both as people and as a band.

You're permanently on tour. Do you write songs during soundchecks?

We definitely need to learn, and we're learning right now, we're trying to change our way of writing.

To write your first record you obviously have all the time in the world - and we had 24 years to write "the perfect record" - but a year and a half, two years later you have to put out another record, you're under constant pressure and, obviously, you reach a point where you're always on tour, and the way we've worked so far has been unusual: Tom went back to his parents' house and wrote a few melodies, but we've had to learn to carve out time for ourselves: during soundcheck we try out bits of songs, we throw out ideas and try to turn them into a song. Once we're back home, we're hoping to get into the studio for a few days so we can focus better. Anyway, yes, ideas are coming together now.

How do you feel about the new material? Do you see it as an imposed duty? Do you feel any pressure?

Right now it's exciting: the most interesting thing about being in a band is writing a song, looking at each other and thinking: "Wow, this track is really good!" It's harder to do that with people around, because writing a song happens in a very fragile moment: if something distracts you, it's hard to feel truly involved. It's definitely an intense moment, but we don't experience it as a duty: we're having fun.

I was on your website and I was struck by the forum. Do you read it? What's your relationship with your fans like?

We read it often.

And do you post there?

No, I've never posted on the forum.

It's strange to see how many people are involved... The last count was almost 1700 people, and all these people take the trouble to spend their time to feel a bit involved...

People talk about other things too, but mainly they discuss the band, what we do and how we behave (smiles).

It's strange to see how many people are interested in what we do. Sometimes it's really interesting to read some of the comments. Anyway, no, we don't post on the forum.

Do you plan on using it for new songs or to improve your shows?

Probably not. Some of the most active people on the forum come to our shows regularly. We know them pretty well, you know, they've basically become friends of ours, they come to the shows and then we chat and have a lot of laughs. Even the artwork for our latest single was designed by one of our fans. We talked about it, he sent us some ideas, and that's amazing. If we can get you as involved as possible, that ends up benefiting us too, and I hope it was as enjoyable for that guy as it was for us.

It's great to know that the bond with our fans keeps growing.

Perché “Editors” e perché “The Back Room”?

There's no particular meaning hidden behind the band's name. Some band names don't make any sense at all, but they're beautiful names anyway. It's just "a brand". It's just a way for people to recognize us, we don't attach any particular meaning to it.

"The Back Room" is mentioned in the lyrics of "Camera", which is on the record. "Camera" is an important song for us, and the moment we wrote it was exciting, also because we wrote it all together in the studio, it hadn't been composed beforehand. In that song we look into the back room, where we hide our feelings and secrets: it's a place sheltered from others, and you want no one to see it.

It's a very important song, with very intense lyrics, and we wanted the whole album to lead back to that place.

Do you enjoy shooting music videos?

(Smiles) Actually... We've had some really bad experiences.

We just shot a video in Amsterdam and it was really boring: I played the same song about fifty times, and I can assure you it was truly exhausting and tedious. That's how you end up getting sick of your own songs: by shooting videos!

For the "Bullets" video we were really lucky, because it was a sunny summer day and we were in a nature park in the middle of London, with all these animals and stuff around. We basically just sat in the sun drinking and having fun... it was like a little holiday: it was probably the only day off we had all last summer, and yet there we were, shooting a video!

Let's talk about festivals now: Reading, Glastonbury and, in April, Coachella.

Festivals are fantastic! You know, they're very different from regular concerts, anything can go wrong: you don't do a sound-check, you just close your eyes and dive in.

The craziest thing is backstage: the musicians seem to be the most relaxed people there, because the only thing they have to worry about is getting on stage and playing when they're told to, while everyone else is running around like mad trying to find people, places, food and drinks… It's interesting to watch all those people rushing back and forth. And it's fun too…

We've still got a couple of minutes, so let me ask you what's the stupidest question anyone has ever asked you.

Nothing hugely stupid… We keep getting asked about Joy Division, it happens all the time and it's starting to get irritating. (Smiles) It's become a bit tiresome because it happens in practically every interview now, so thanks for not asking about it. Maybe that's the most irritating thing… No, wait! Someone once asked me if I prefer dogs or cats… (we laugh)

(Milan, February 5, 2006)

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