Elbow album gigs

Exclusive: 4th record's full live outing

18 March 08 - Elbow are planning to play their new album The Seldom Seen Kid, in full, in gigs around the world.

The band’s fourth album, which was released on 17 March, has received rave reviews and they are the only band in history to get 9/10 four times in the NME.

And the band intend to give the record a full live outing, as Guy Garvey explained to 6 Music: “I think the way we are gonna do it is we’re gonna tour the UK and the States and Europe.

“And then when we’ve done that, we’re gonna play the whole album as a show. I’m not sure where yet but a couple of mayor cities per country perhaps but eventually we’ll play the whole of the album as a continual show.”

Motivation for shows

The motivation for the shows is to celebrate the album format.

“We’re a little bit worried about albums as an art form. You know Muse have expressed an interest in maybe not releasing albums anymore and Ash have as well.

“Albums are important and albums are an art form in their own right and where as our songs work individually, they're chapters of one novel rather than short stories in a collection.”

Muse style

Front man in Muse, Matt Bellamy, has previously said: "I don’t think we’re going to approach the next album like we’re making an album.

"I like the idea of releasing a series of songs, every month or every couple of months – just putting songs out there.

Of course Elbow are not the first band to consider playing their album in full at gigs. Radiohead played their entire album In Rainbows for 200 fans at an in-store gig in East London in January.

Don't Look Back gigs

And the 'Don't Look Back' series of gigs has recently seen a raft of artists play classic albums live. And Elbow want to be part of that heritage of classic albums.

“One of the reasons we’re gonna play the album as one performance is to illustrate the fact that we’re an album band from a long line of album bands.

“We feel that we’re doing what we’re doing because of bands – starting at the Velvet Underground and moving through Pink Floyd and even early Genesis y’know – that’s what we do – that’s what we want to do.”


Kelly Stooke