Editors – EBM review

Change is a multi-faceted and continuous process, but before we get off like this is a therapy session, it’s worth remembering that for a musician your room for manoeuvere when doing so is often limited.

Take Editors for instance. Formed after they met at university and set apart by vocalist Tom Smith’s rich baritone, their doomy brand of electrified post-punk handed them early noughties success alongside the likes of White Lies, second album An End Has A Start reaching the summit of the charts.

Since then Smith and co. have gradually bled synthesisers and programming into their sound, but EBM sees them notionally embracing it fully in the wake of recruiting maverick producer Benjamin John Power, AKA Blanck Mass.

Power brings with him ideas which have been described as proper to a ‘dirty rave’, but guitars or no guitars, Editors still rely on mood and melodrama, Silence a breezy electronic ballad, opener Heart Attack festival ready; the best moment here is the most backward looking, the epic 8 minute long Kiss winding back to synth-pop’s 80’s peak. In going for revolution but ending up with evolution, EBM proves that true change is much harder than it looks.

You can read a full review here.