Barfly

The Wombats, Glasvegas, The Hold Steady, Black Lips, Iron & Wine, The Subways plus many more……. Bringing the best new music from across the world to Brighton on: 15^th, 16^th and 17^th May 2008.The Great Escape, the biggest and best city based festival in the UK is growing bigger by the day as the organisers confirm the latest bands in the 2008 line up. The policy to book the best new and rising artists from all over the world is really taking shape with most recent confirmations from The Wombats, The Hold Steady, The Subways, Black Lips, White Lies, Monobright, Iron and Wine, Public Service Announcers, Born Ruffians, Broken Mirrors, Ipso Facto, Beat Union, Mother Mother, This City, One Night Only, Teenagers, Crystal Castles, Canterbury, Johnny Foreigner, Ida Maria, Team Waterpolo, Ebony Bones and The Black Angels.   Already booked were;  Young Knives, Joe Lean and the Jing Jang Jong, Yeasayer, Black Mountain, No Age, Tunng, Lightspeed Champion, Wild Beasts, Fujiya & Miyagi, Peter Von Poehl and School Of Language. The Great Escape is all about  spotting new talent and bringing them to a bigger stage where they can perform to a packed out crowd and the world’s booking agents, festival bookers and record labels.  The festival will be backing the likes of  Ebony Bones and White Lies who are both currently unsigned and tipped by The Great Escape to follow in the footsteps of  Adele, Kate Nash and Jack Penate who have been incredibly successful since playing the festival.

Early Bird Festival Tickets are £35 (plus booking fee) through www.escapegreat.com and the ticket line 0870 907 0999Plus cash box offices Rounder, Resident and The Dome Box office in Brighton and Stargreen (Oxford Circus)

 

Keep checking www.escapegreat.com for updates!

 With their personal musical pecaddilloes ranging from soul and r'n'b to techno and the weirder byways of post-rock and beyond, the end result of this pick n mix fiesta has emerged as as lean, cosmic, funky pop of all shapes and sizes. Their debut EP for fledgeling East London label People In the Sky appeared in Oct 06 and came with three tracks; the sinewy,  funk - heavy strut of Photobooth leading the way, cosmic rocker 'Its Over Now' heading up the b side with its shades of MBV and M83, and tucked away as the B2 an irreverant take on the Frankie Knuckles/Jamies Principle (not Candy friggin' Statton!) House classic 'Your Love'. Since then they've recorded sessions for XFM s’ Jon Kennedy and Radio 1s Rob Da Bank (who named them as one of his bands to watch in 07), garnered some choice press attention, played explosive gigs in everything from Hoxton Disco’s to toilets on the Kilburn High Rd and fashion parties in Barcelona, all the while writing and recording new material. The next three track EP is ready to go, there’s a national tour coming in February / March, and some heavy weight support slots in the offing .

The Black Lips are what you could call true visionaries of a skeptical age. Even from their very first 7" EP, you could tell they were doing their own thing on their own terms, and of course it didn't sit well, even with the dawning of the 21st century and all it promised. Wildly cross-eyed broken stars destined to waver in their importance in the cosmos, they know no boundaries and they take no pretense. Like a volatile and teetering amalgamation of the SWELL MAPS trying to cover the SWINGIN' MEDALLIONS, it's just not right for this world. The Black Lips are a dazzling catastrophe that needs to be absorbed before it vaporizes into thin air. The fun these guys have is hard to hide either live or on record. Seriously slurred swashbucklers living out the ultimate teenage dream, yet breaking through another layer of remarkable idiocy, transcribed through hallucinations, exasperation, and perfectly casual dick fumbling.

Such perennial sophistication causes the very foundation of "FLOWER PUNK" to be lysergisized, germinated, fertilized, and fully pollenated. Let it Bloom, and it's fruit, will feed the next generation of off-centered, slop-a-licious rock'n roll pioneers for years to come. How the Black Lips manage to walk through the perfumed garden of life is a miracle of modern bullshit, but a miracle nonetheless. Their validity is overwhelming and so refreshing, it almost makes you dizzy... Their substance is real, their new album is prerequisite, and their message is disturbingly clear. Rock'n Roll is soul-stirringly powerful and unpredictable, and there's nothing more important than that. It's noteveryday that a band can exorcize such an atrociously beautiful THIRD album, so it may be hard for you to grasp, like the rest of us. These boys have tapped into a very secret well that everyone wants to drink from. Too bad it's got weird bent rainbows and chunks of shit floating in it.