Weekly Round Up (02 Mar 2009)

Hi everybody. Another week of intense music activity is summarised here!

Festival Fever
It's been a week of confirmations, with many a festival finalising its line-up for this year. As keeping you up-to-date of all the latest developments would require full-time dedication, an impossible task, I've kindly added some links to the top festival sites on the sidebar. More will be added as and when their festivals start to take shape.

As an exception, I feel I should go into a little more detail on the SOS 4.8 festival, seeing as though it's taking place on my door step. It would appear the line-up is now definitive, which means Duffy was the last minute surprise - it certainly was totally unexpected, indeed many would say unwanted. One piece of better news, however, is that local boys Second will again take part.

NO times have been confirmed yet, but the official webpage has revealed the distribution by day and stage:

Friday 1st May
Main 'Estrella Levante' Stage
The Prodigy
Babyshambles
Duffy
Spiritualized

Stage Two
Boyz Noise
Those Dancing Days
Peaches
El Guincho
Klaus & Kinski

PJ Harvey & John Parish will appear in the Auditorium.

Saturday 2nd May
Main 'Estrella Levante' Stage
Underworld
2ManyDJs
Matthew Herbert (DJ Set)
Keane
Los Planetas

Stage Two
The Wombats
Ladyhawke
Second
Russian Red
Catpeople
Ross

Saturday's Auditorium appearance is reserved for The Matthew Herbert Big Band.

At first glance, the Saturday appears to look more promising, but then I'm biased 'cos that's the day I can go! However, with the Los Planetas moving to Saturday, as far as I'm concerned there's no weak link (and NO Duffy!). My mouth is watering! There'll be a special SOS feature as we get closer to the festival.

By the way, the inaugural NME-E poll hailed The Wombats as the most exciting SOS act with a whopping 70% of the votes. Of course, it might have been a different story had Duffy been announced earlier! (enough, give the poor girl a break). Thanks to everyone who voted, which makes about 6 of you, 'cos I voted several times to avoid total embarrassment!

Other Stories
Two of the SOS bands are also in the news this week.

The Prodigy's new release 'Invaders Must Die' has gone straight to Number 1 in the UK album charts, making it one of the fastest-selling releases this year so far having sold over nearly 100,000 copies in the first week. An NME-E review will appear later on in the week.


Back in Murcia, the eagerly awaited Second gig will take place this Saturday in the Sala Audio (kick off at 21.30, tickets priced 12€). Muricans are in for a treat this Spring as the local boys will be on stage twice in the space of two months. Must admit, I'm really looking forward to seeing their live performance. NME-E's first gig review will appear next week.

And finally, another band making a comeback. Faith No More have released a statement confirming that they will reunite for a tour this year. It appears that 10 years after they split
they've started talking to each other again and fancy a second crack at the whip.

Hmmmm, times are hard!

You can read the full statement here.

Myspace Magic
As usual, a frenetic Myspace week. After last week's interview with Liverpool's The Trestles, I managed to get hold of a copy of their new EP 'Hard Faced Town', a review of which will be posted in the next few days.

Mancunians Its A Buffalo have released their debut album 'Don't Be Scared' two weeks ahead of schedule. I was fortunate to interview them recently, so there'll be more in the next week or so. This bunch are good mates with The Courteeners and supported them on tour last year - not a bad introduction!

Fellow Manchester boys Mutineers have also uploaded some tracks ahead of a tour in May.

Across the pond, two US bands have updated their profiles with new material this week. The Constabulary and The Takeover UK have both added new tracks, the latter coinciding with the start of their US tour. If you haven't heard their stuff, I recommend a visit.

Other than that, the usual barrage of friend requests, interviews and chat. Especially pleasing to see more Spanish bands getting in touch. I'm trying to get round to covering all the bands who I've spoken to, but time is normally in short supply, so please be patient!

Reviews
The big release of the week is U2's 'No Line On The Horizon', which will undoubtedly be reviewed in the not too distant future. Another release of note is the Howling Bells second album, 'Radio Wars', which will also be on the stereo for analysis in due course.

One album I also came across this week, but which has in fact been out for about a month is Sky Larkin with 'The Golden Spike'. Seems a bit late to review it now, but any discerning Los Campesinos! fan or indie freak might be interested in having a listen.


Think that's about it. Now about those pending interviews.....