Making First Steps

The challenge was that they weren't asking for a typical Elbow song

as much as a sports theme tune.

We knew it would sound like us, because that's unavoidable

because we're doing it,

but we didn't want it to be an Elbow song as such.

We came in this room

and we said, "Right, OK,

"we've got to write a song for the BBC for the Olympics."

We just sat around and started going...

HE DRUMS ON LEGS

Drumming on our legs, just an exciting, compulsive sort of rhythm

and we moved from there, really.

We knew it had to be huge and anthemic and over the top.

I've only seen storyboards for the animation,

so we're looking forward to seeing all that as well.

We knew Elbow was doing it

and that it was going to be anthemic.

I did two sketches really quickly that really came to mind.

There was a profile image of a lock with a giant diving platform

and a very small diver on it

and then the other shot I sketched was the sprinters in the blocks.

We didn't want to go superhero,

we wanted to kind of tread a new ground

between being fantasy superhero but being real

and we wanted to pay the athletes kind of as much respect as possible.

The visual end frame summed up the overall idea.

It was the coming together of all of the UK as viewers of the Olympics.

We've never been asked to do anything like this at all, really,

nothing this big. I think the closer it's getting, the Olympics,

you realise what a massive thing for the country it is.

LAUGHTER

Can I introduce Guy Garvey and Craig Potter from Elbow?

It's by far the biggest orchestra we've worked with,

the Philharmonic, yeah.

The first idea...

..was mine.

The first thing you hear should be a brass fanfare.

The first five notes were to represent the five rings

and that was just somewhere to start.

Almost a call to arms, you know,

if you hear it on the TV, people need to know,

"That's the Olympics on, let's go and watch the Olympics."

The decision to sort of involve a choir as well

was just to make it more everyman.

There isn't a sound that encapsulates that more than a gospel choir.

Losing it. Don't listen to each other, listen to the click.

# The moon... #

The lyrics to the song are actually about

parents watching their kids' first steps

because as you can probably tell,

I've absolutely no experience of athletics of any kind.

LAUGHTER

It was during the writing of the track

that Pete's baby daughter Martha walked for the first time

and we all got this video that he'd taken on his phone

and I was thinking, actually,

this moment has got lots and lots of human elements to it.

They're proud of her

and it's about their hopes for her being realised

and it just seemed to fit

if I really simply wrote the lyrics about feelings of pride

and also that, you know, "We're with you," that element,

then that's kind of related to what's happening

when you're backing your team

or when you're willing an athlete to win.

# Our strength

# And love

# All in

# Your blood

# Our hope... #

'Who was first was always going to be a sprinter'

and then you kind of would balance that with a swimmer, to be fair,

so that represents the Olympics and sport quite well.

We introduced a weightlifter. He could kind of represent

a bigger version of everybody else that was going on.

Then we went, "OK, so who's the small athlete

"that kind of counterbalances the big, strong weightlifter?"

So we looked at the gymnastics

and we went for a very tiny gymnastic girl.

We liked the finish and the success in her eyes and her happiness.

We definitely wanted to bring personality to these characters too.

There's far more losers than winners, really,

so we felt we needed something that was reassuring and sympathetic

but had a tint of sadness to it,

because that's the place not to lose, isn't it, for an athlete?

At the Olympics.

We called it the love theme at one point

but it doesn't really suit it because

it's more the losers' theme, I suppose you could call it!

But me and my drummer, Jupp,

whenever the theme came up, we were doing that at each other.

HE LAUGHS

Now we're trying to tell a story

so that story comes from the script from the agency, then we do an interpretation of it.

There's a classic three-act structure to athletics.

If you took sprinting,

there's the waiting, there's the gun that goes off,

there's the running and then there's the finish line.

Although we kept that kind of three-act structure,

this is really where Elbow's music comes into it

because it's got an emotional arc to it, there's ups and downs

and you can feel and you can see what's going on.

The classic thing would have been

sunny blue skies for the summer Olympics.

Really, what we wanted to get

was a little bit of mood, little bit of grit into it, overcast skies,

with sun kind of breaking through gaps.

The best outcome for us

is that people watch what's going to unfold,

the drama that's going to unfold,

and they don't notice the music.

The piece of music was designed to accompany the Olympics,

this ridiculous endeavour on the part of all these people,

this is the high point of most of their lives.

So we got the music to a place where

we were feeling very emotional, having heard it 100 times,

we were still feeling the moods within the piece

so hopefully, there won't be a dry eye in the country.

# Our strength... #

I'm really proud to have lived here for such a long time

and have a vision of what I love about London and the UK.

I've worked on the third, fourth floor of this building for ages

and I look out the window constantly

and I can look down to the street

and I can be completely inspired by the people walking past

or the pub across the road or I can see all the chimney stacks.

I look out there and I love it.

The lighting changes constantly. I find that really inspiring.

All the hope expressed in the vocal,

kind of pre-emptive feelings about the beginning of the games

and all the people coming together for one thing,

which is a great thing,

this sort of noble fanfare,

which is to do with the heritage and the tradition of it,

and people being the best they can be in their field

and then this theme for people who've tried and failed,

a sympathetic theme for them,

all come together in one big anthem at the end

and we really decided that it couldn't be big enough, really,

it had to be a really grand ending, and it seemed like we added...

we added something to the climax on a weekly basis

until it was time to record it with the orchestra, and it sounded great.

# Woo! #

CLAPPING

Sounded great, sounded great.

-Well done, mate.

-Well done.

Cheers!

I was sat in Media City waiting for somebody

and the background music in the lobby was all the BBC sports themes

so Ski Sunday and Grandstand and all these things

and I was thinking, "This is a weird coincidence."

Then I thought, "No, this is where BBC Sports are based, I get it now."

But it was really encouraging, that,

because I thought, "Yeah, this stands up with those."

It's never going to beat Ski Sunday, though, is it?

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