If only I lived in the UK, I could have watched this — Elbow performed the entirety of The Seldom Seen Kid live with the BBC orchestra at Abbey Road Studios.
Fortunate, then, that I’ve learned that the concert will be released as a limited edition CD/DVD package through the band’s website in March.
I’ve heard a *cough*bootleg*cough* of the concert; it sounds magnificent. The swell of strings on “The Loneliness of the Tower Crane Driver,” for instance, brings me to tears. Just listening to some of these songs is painful. There’s a heartbreaking beauty to something like “Some Riot” that’s breathtaking, and it’s impossible not to be moved. Times like this I remember Gandalf’s admonishion that not all tears are evil.
And Guy Garvey’s voice!
Backed by a full string orchestra! And a choir! And Richard Hawley on “The Fix”!
If you live in the UK, check out the first link; you can watch the entire concert for free for the next few days.
And if you don’t live in the UK, March cannot come soon enough. 🙂
And in other Elbow news, work will begin shortly on their fifth studio album, with release planned for the end of the year.
Richard Hawley? I’m intrigued. Have you heard his Coles Corner album?