ON THE MAIN STAGE
Sunday 27th August at The Carling Weekend: Reading Festival
Friday 25th August at The Carling Weekend: Leeds Festival
Over the last ten years PLACEBO have steadily become one of the biggest UK bands in the world. With albums from 2000’s “Black Market Music” through 2003’s “Sleeping With Ghosts”, the trio that sprung to UK attention in the midst of the ‘laddisms’ of Britpop with the sexual ambiguity of “Nancy Boy” and “Bruise Pristine” in 1994 rose to become a global act in the biggest sense of the word. Hand in hand with such phenomenal success has been a life spent on the road, playing huge shows across the world and making PLACEBO into one of the most dynamic and compelling bands of the current time. With over 6 million albums sold worldwide, recently released new album “Meds” features guest vocals from VV of The Kills and good friend Michael Stipe and looks guaranteed to continue the worldwide sales pattern that saw last album “Sleeping With Ghosts sell 1.5 million across the globe. PLACEBO continue to steadfastly resist the vagaries of the UK music scene to create classic music that speaks to fans worldwide and these performances are sure to further increase their enormous appeal.
With over 2 million copies of their debut album, “Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge” sold across the world, MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE are one of the biggest bands in the world right now. Despite such colossal sales, this is a band with their feet firmly on the ground, as NME noted at a recent South By South West show, “for all the planet felching hugeness their ride has involved, they’re still as punk rock as any of the bands that have played on flat bed trucks this week”. With a recently released special 3 disc DVD, “Life On The Murder Scene” for old fans to relive their favourite live moments and for new fans to bring themselves up to date whilst these performances at the festivals are sure to be greeted with mass excitement from their phenomenal fanbase. With hints of new material before the end of the year, the continued rise of MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE seems assured.
ON THE RADIO ONE / NME STAGE
Fresh from a headlining slot on this year’s NME Awards Tour, MAXIMO PARK come to the festivals in the best of shape. Recent single, “I Want You To Stay” continued to raise the band’s profile to the stratosphere as debut album, “A Certain Trigger” climbs it’s way to platinum certification. Debut single, “Grafitti” / “Going Missing” now changes hands for upwards of £50 and, in the short space of under 2 years, the Newcastle five piece have gone from virtual unknowns to one of the biggest UK bands of the moment. Much of this is down to singer Paul Smith’s unique take on the world and striking stage performances, alongside some of the snappiest alternative pop songs of recent memory. With rumours of a second album on the way, these first festival headline shows for the band are yet another marker on their way to a guaranteed long stay in the premier league of UK bands.
THE RAKES have spent the year in some rarefied company. Supporting fellow festival attendees Franz Ferdinand on their UK tour at the end of the year, the band who lit up the year with classic singles such as “22 Grand Job”, “Retreat” and “Strasbourg” have gone from London’s favourite live band to one of the UK’s most popular alternative bands. Recent single, “All Too Human”, demonstrated that there is plenty more to come from the band. With hopes for new material before the end of the year, these shows could be a first chance to hear what follows debut album, “Capture / Release”.
With a Top Ten debut album (“Inside In / Inside Out”) and hit singles in the form of “Sofa Song”, “You Don’t Love Me” and current Top 5 “Naïve”, THE KOOKS look set to make 2006 their own. Emerging from Brighton last year, the five piece started to pick up a lot of media attention with a string of small shows across the country towards the end of 2005. A deliberate and stated reaction to the bands who “siphon a career out of the middle eight of ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’”, THE KOOKS shows and tracks are a glorious pop explosion that brings to mind the greatest moments of British music through the ages. Still in their early twenties, this is a story that is very much at its beginning. Catch the highlight of the opening chapter.
David Jensen Photography:
https://www.davidjensen.co.uk/
