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Review by Rob.

Next stop the stadiums .

In recent reviews I have been over how Sheffield Octagon is an excellent venue to see a band and nothing has changed so we will skip this bit this time out. There was a value for money bill tonight with three act on. I missed the openers but turned up just in time to see Ra Ra Riot take to the stage. Apparently this lot were on the verge of a major breakthrough not long ago, but tragically the drummer John Pike drowned in mysterious circumstances. Unavowed the band have decided to carry on so here they are now. There are quite a few of them and some of them play more unusual instruments like the double bass and other assorted strings. Really we are talking about an Arcade Fire type act here. However when they play they take on a more epic feel much like Hope of the States. Sure some of the stuff is like Arcade Fire but with elements of folk mixed in with the pop stuff they sure have potential. File under ones to watch for 2008.

Recently I came across an article on the Editors when it was written that perhaps they have come around too late and their ideal time would have been the early eighties at the fag end of Joy Division and when Goth music was just becoming big business. On the face of it there is a point there, the subject material of a lot of their songs is death and beyond, and of course they have the doom laden multi layered vocals of Tom Smith. But step away from these comparisons and also those of Interpol and you begin to see differences. Firstly where Interpol use the art of New York in their music, Editors opt for something more grand, more loud, more akin perhaps to fellow brummies Led Zep - forget the suburbs this is the sound of the Stadiums. Secondly where a lot of goth bands have a shoe gazing guitarist shuffling around onstage, editors have Chris Urbanowicz and his Rickenbacker blasting out those chiming chords recalling the large open spaces previously described by The Edge. It is at one such point in the show when his guitar produces another soaring riff that you realise this band are far far too big for a venue of this size.

So in a nutshell Editors want to be big, sorry make that huge. Debut album 'The Black Room' did place them firmly in the gloomy UK urban landscape so beloved of Joy Division, but also a Euro Rock feel even darker, perhaps leaning towards tunes by Bauhaus for example. New Album 'An end has a Start', the title track of which they open with tonight changed all that overnight. With its setlist of great epic sounding rock tunes it has propelled them into a world of planes, festival slots and celebrity girlfriends. Musically its all technically perfect and it would be easy to dismiss them as this year's Coldplay, especially when Smith sits by his piano and knocks out a ballad. However there's one thing that will ensure the rise of this band to big things, simply a shed load of great songs. So the machine gun riff of 'Bullets' follows the machine gun riff of 'Bones', and the superb 'Blood' and 'Escape the Nest' keep the tempo up. Even better is 'Weight of the World' with its 'Love replaces fear' refrain a tune surely designed to be their first real epic. If there are any critisisms its that it is all a bit too clinical and perhaps they should consider a live reworking of some of the older stuff, something, to be fair, that they do attempt towards the end with 'Munich'.

Another plus is the one new tune they air. Although I didnt catch the title it is right up there with the best stuff they played tonight and bodes well for the future. The greatest moment tonight comes during the encore when they play the hit single 'Smokers outside the hospital Doors'. Big, long and epic it is a great tune, one of the best of 2007 and deserves the rapturous welcome it recieves tonight from the sold out crowd. The leave with the early tune 'Fingers in the Factories' and like the prophetic line 'Keep with me' it seems that all of tonight's crowd and lots more in future will be doing just that. This was surely the last chance to see them in a venue of this size. By next year Editors could well be the biggest band in the world.

Editors played:-
An end has a Start
Bones
Bullets
Blood
Weight of the World
All Sparks
Escape the Nest
New Song
When anger Shows
Spiders
Lights
Heads in Bags
The Racing Rats
Munich
Encores
You are Fading
Smokers outside the hospital Doors
Fingers in the Factories

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