Editors- In This Light And On This Evening

In This Light And On This Evening, Editors third album to date, is somewhat of a departure from their previous output. Whilst vocalist Tom Smith’s recognisable baritone remains at the core of the songs, that second trademark Editors sound, delay soaked guitars, is gone. In their place we have keyboards.

It’s a well trodden path: Bands from New Order to Bloc Party; from The Cure to Radiohead, have all put down their guitars in favour of keys at one point or another in their careers- to varying degrees of success. For Editors, this transition to a more electronic sound is easy.The synths serve the same purpose as the guitars in previous releases The Back Room and The End Has A Start, adding atmosphere to the tracks whilst the rhythm section drives the main focus of the song. A good example of this is in second track Bricks And Mortar which has a bass line strangely reminiscent of The Horror’s recent single Sea Within a Sea and the lyrical refrain “I hope life is good for you”.

This is immediately followed by lead single Papillon, which sounds so convincingly like the band decided to get together and write a trance track that it comes as no surprise that the single release contains a remix by trance hero Tiesto.

In This Light and On This Evening is by no means a perfect album. The mid-section of The Big Exit and The Boxer seem to drag a little and bog the album down. However, these are more than made up for by the oddly titled Raw Meat= Blood Drool, perhaps the most exciting moment on the album. Here Tom Smith’s voice is almost frantic between a pounding drum beat and schizophrenic keys. It is quite unlike anything we have previously witnessed from Editors and hopefully Heralds a new and exciting direction for the band.


Score: 3/5
(originally published in Exeter university Exepose student newspaper)