Latest news with #Pulp
Metro
a day ago
- Entertainment
- Metro
Inside Oasis' ‘last great gathering' at Knebworth that defined everything
Summer 2025 has felt somewhat nostalgic with acts like Pulp, Supergrass and of course, the band of the moment, Oasis, performing to sold-out crowds across the country. If we roll (with it!) back the years to the summer of 1996, Oasis were the band of the moment then too, and their record-breaking performance of Knebworth was infinitely the gig of the decade. Two-and-a-half million people applied for tickets, which equated to more than 4% of the population at the time, making it the largest demand for gig tickets in British history. There's no doubt that Oasis could have sold out another two weeks' worth of shows based on the insatiable demand. Noel and Liam Gallagher and co. approached everything with fearless determination, and their relentless spirit made what seemed like the musical equivalent of scaling Everest feel like a walk in the (Knebworth) park. Knebworth undoubtedly stands as one of the boldest and most monumental events in British music history. Oasis transformed it into a defining moment – it wasn't just a milestone for the record-breaking band; it became a life-changing experience for everyone who was there. Marcus Russell, the band's manager, told NME in 2006: 'Knebworth wasn't meant to be a historic moment. It became one because of the people who experienced it – every kid who was there,' while Noel himself told the publication, 'It was the last great gathering of the people before the birth of the internet.' The 250,000-strong sold-out crowd didn't just witness one of the world's biggest bands at their peak; they also got to enjoy some of the most electrifying acts from the UK music scene, including The Charlatans, Ocean Colour Scene, The Prodigy, and more. Russell shared the reasoning behind the lineup, saying, 'I think Oasis went out of their way to put a special bill together that was representative of the time and pretty diverse.' Even back in 1996, the idea of seeing a lineup like the one at Knebworth was mind-blowing. As Alan McGee put it to The Independent, 'At that moment in 1996, that bill was probably as good as it got.' Oasis aimed to create an event that would be etched in memory forever, and they wanted to share that experience with their musical peers. So, what do the supporting acts remember about this unforgettable moment? One of the standout acts at Knebworth was The Prodigy, who were invited by Noel to be part of the history-making gigs. Recalling how the band were asked to get involved, Prodigy member Liam Howlett once said, 'Remembering back, Keef was friends with Noel and on a night out, Noel asked Keef if we would play one of their Knebworth gigs. It was the slot right before they [Oasis] played. Keef mentioned it to the rest of us, and without much discussion, we all said 'F**k yeah!'' To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video He added: 'The main memory I have of it is as we were walking on stage to play, Noel came up to me and said 'Play Poison!'. We did our thing , came off and we were buzzing! Then I remember grabbing a load of booze and going out the front to watch them play. It was epic, a moment in time never to be forgotten!' For the 4% of the UK population fortunate enough to score tickets to the biggest show on Earth, it was, for some, a Squid Games-style challenge, while for others, it was a perfect example of trusting the universe and sheer determination in action. More Trending While some Oasis fans were locked in a battle with phone lines for tickets, others, like Georgina Sturmer, stood in line outside the London Astoria and subsequently took a coach up to Hertfordshire. She vividly remembers sprinting with her friends to claim the best spot for a perfect view of her musical idols and still has her original Knebworth tickets, in near mint condition. Musician and Oasis fan Steve Mahoney also kept his tickets from that unforgettable day. His strongest memory is the thrill of hearing two brand new, unreleased Oasis tracks It's Gettin' Better (Man!!) and My Big Mouth, which would later appear on Be Here Now in 1997. Oasis's Knebworth shows are considered to have defined the Britpop era and had a significant impact on live music. The two gigs were the absolute pinnacle in the band's career, both musically and culturally. For the rockers, Knebworth marked the pinnacle of their rapid ascent, with a two-night set that defined both their career and an entire era for thousands of music fans. Oasis had always set their sights on becoming the world's biggest rock 'n' roll band, and thanks to those two unforgettable nights at Knebworth, they achieved it. Their performances remain some of the most iconic and celebrated in their history, cementing Knebworth as one of their greatest gigs ever. Got a story? If you've got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the entertainment team by emailing us celebtips@ calling 020 3615 2145 or by visiting our Submit Stuff page – we'd love to hear from you. MORE: Road Rash Is the best Sega Mega Drive racing game – Reader's Feature MORE: Sarah Michelle Gellar proves she still slays in first look at Buffy revamp MORE: Wembley Stadium investigating Oasis ticket scam that 'allowed hundreds to sneak into gig'
Irish Independent
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Irish Independent
50 reasons the 1990s were cool: From Blur versus Oasis to text messages and the Boys in Green – the things we loved in an edgy decade
From fashion to music and TV shows, there's an appetite for all things 1990s right now. But is it just nostalgia or was it a decade that shaped who we are? When Oasis take to the Croke Park stage on Saturday, it will mark the 30th anniversary to the weekend of one of the great cultural memories of the 1990s — their chart battle with Blur for UK number one. Britpop was at its zenith in 1995. (What's the Story) Morning Glory? saw Oasis deliver Britain's best-selling album of the entire decade, while Pulp's Different Class would capture the zeitgeist spectacularly. And, they are still at large. Besides a fine new album, Jarvis Cocker and friends rolled back the years at a memorable Dublin show earlier this summer. The weekend after Oasis, another of the '90s biggest exports, Robbie Williams, will also pull the masses into Croke Park. It is fair to say the final decade of the 20th century is having a moment again. And it's not just music. Friends is hoovering up an entire new generation of fans who weren't even born when it first aired on TV. YouTube is reminding us of the pleasures of live TV show TFI Friday. Even Nokia – perhaps the quintessential brand of the '90s – is having a comeback.
The Guardian
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘Flyovers can be incredibly beautiful!' Long Blondes singer Kate Jackson's new career as a motorway artist
As the singer in cult indie band the Long Blondes, Kate Jackson experienced all the thrills of the mid-00s music scene: chaotic gigs, hedonistic parties, an abundance of winklepickers and angular fringes. But years later, when she went back over all the photographs she'd taken during that period, things looked rather different. 'I've got tons of photos of airport lounges and long stretches of road in Europe,' she says with a shake of the head. 'Lots of German service stations. Nothing of the band! No backstage fun, no frolics!' Jackson may regret not capturing more of the band's short but spectacular heyday, but the road has always been important to her. As a Pulp-obsessed teenager in Bury St Edmunds, she would gaze out of the kitchen window and dream of escaping small town life via the A14. The Long Blondes track Separated By Motorways told the story of two girls doing a runner down that exact road ('Wipe your eyes darling, it's OK / Meet me on the dual carriageway'). And over the last decade or so, roads have become a central feature of her second career in visual art. Using bold, pop art-inspired colours and sharp geometrical lines, Jackson's paintings transform parts of our unloved motorway network into dazzling scenes of romance and possibility. Think Ed Ruscha's gas stations propelled along by the motorik beat of Kraftwerk's Autobahn. The service station at Leicester Forest East has never looked more beautiful. Jackson lists Andy Warhol, Australian surrealist Jeffrey Smart and printmaker Paul Catherall as influences – but also the lyrics of Jarvis Cocker. 'I love how he could write about the interior of a bedroom and make it seem like the most exotic, romantic place in the world,' she says. 'I try to do the same thing with my paintings of flyovers and bridges. Nobody really takes any notice of them. You're always whizzing by. But there's always a moment when the light catches them in a particular way and makes them seem incredibly beautiful.' This month, Jackson has been selected to pick the theme for DRAW!, a nationwide drawing project backed by David Hockney that is part of Bradford 2025 UK City of Culture. She has chosen 'landscape', and will be on social media encouraging people of all ages to pick up a pen or pencil or iPad and sketch something fitting. The project's aim is to get people to pause and reflect on their surroundings, and it's already having an impact – on Jackson herself. 'It's funny,' she says. 'You spend years trying to develop your own style, to make your work recognisable. But then you get stuck in that style. You stop experimenting and you stop being playful. And art is all about experimentation and being playful. So this has made me go back to my sketchbooks and try different things.' Jackson is actually creating a new body of work as we speak, saying she's 'completely changed everything' as a result of DRAW! 'I'm using a celestial astrological wheel, drawing the symbols that represent the star signs and bringing some animals in.' She has drawn and painted since she was young, sketching boats on the harbour with her 'very talented' artist mother. She would have completed a fine art degree in Sheffield had the Long Blondes not taken off during her final year – even then, she carried on making art for their record sleeves. In fact, she thinks a painting of Diana Dors made in her student bedroom may have helped the band crystalise their aesthetic: a mixture of retro glamour, film and literary references, and spiky guitars. With her neck scarf and beret, Jackson added some much-needed style and intellect to the era's male-dominated indie scene. The band earned a devoted fanbase and wrote one of the defining anthems of the 2000s: the disco-punk single Giddy Stratospheres. But after two albums, guitarist and songwriter Dorian Cox had a stroke and was left unable to play the guitar. The band called it a day. Sign up to Art Weekly Your weekly art world round-up, sketching out all the biggest stories, scandals and exhibitions after newsletter promotion Jackson released a solo album in 2016: the excellent British Road Movies, written with Bernard Butler. But that record's painful gestation convinced her to redirect her attention towards painting. She spent four years refining her style in Rome, and has developed an eye for brutalist landmarks as well as all the motorways and bridges. More recently, though, she has caught the music bug again. During lockdown, and with her then two-year-old son asleep next to her, she found herself messing around with Logic on her iPad and began pushing herself to compose electronic music. Heaven 17's Martyn Ware was impressed with the results and offered to produce them, and a Terry Farley remix of her track Don't Doubt Your Power (recorded under the name Corselette) will hit clubs later this year. It took a while before Jackson could look back fondly on the Long Blondes' time in the spotlight. 'We didn't make Kaiser Chiefs money,' she says with a wry smile. 'But I think [debut album] Someone to Drive You Home still stands the test of time.' And despite the lack of photographic evidence, Jackson knows she had a lot of fun too. 'Oh definitely,' she says. 'In terms of getting to be in a band, that whole period was really the last hurrah.' DRAW! a Landscape with Kate Jackson at
The Guardian
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘Flyovers can be incredibly beautiful!' Long Blondes singer Kate Jackson's new career as a motorway artist
As the singer in cult indie band the Long Blondes, Kate Jackson experienced all the thrills of the mid-00s music scene: chaotic gigs, hedonistic parties, an abundance of winklepickers and angular fringes. But years later, when she went back over all the photographs she'd taken during that period, things looked rather different. 'I've got tons of photos of airport lounges and long stretches of road in Europe,' she says with a shake of the head. 'Lots of German service stations. Nothing of the band! No backstage fun, no frolics!' Jackson may regret not capturing more of the band's short but spectacular heyday, but the road has always been important to her. As a Pulp-obsessed teenager in Bury St Edmunds, she would gaze out of the kitchen window and dream of escaping small town life via the A14. The Long Blondes track Separated By Motorways told the story of two girls doing a runner down that exact road ('Wipe your eyes darling, it's OK / Meet me on the dual carriageway'). And over the last decade or so, roads have become a central feature of her second career in visual art. Using bold, pop art-inspired colours and sharp geometrical lines, Jackson's paintings transform parts of our unloved motorway network into dazzling scenes of romance and possibility. Think Ed Ruscha's gas stations propelled along by the motorik beat of Kraftwerk's Autobahn. The service station at Leicester Forest East has never looked more beautiful. Jackson lists Andy Warhol, Australian surrealist Jeffrey Smart and printmaker Paul Catherall as influences – but also the lyrics of Jarvis Cocker. 'I love how he could write about the interior of a bedroom and make it seem like the most exotic, romantic place in the world,' she says. 'I try to do the same thing with my paintings of flyovers and bridges. Nobody really takes any notice of them. You're always whizzing by. But there's always a moment when the light catches them in a particular way and makes them seem incredibly beautiful.' This month, Jackson has been selected to pick the theme for DRAW!, a nationwide drawing project backed by David Hockney that is part of Bradford 2025 UK City of Culture. She has chosen 'landscape', and will be on social media encouraging people of all ages to pick up a pen or pencil or iPad and sketch something fitting. The project's aim is to get people to pause and reflect on their surroundings, and it's already having an impact – on Jackson herself. 'It's funny,' she says. 'You spend years trying to develop your own style, to make your work recognisable. But then you get stuck in that style. You stop experimenting and you stop being playful. And art is all about experimentation and being playful. So this has made me go back to my sketchbooks and try different things.' Jackson is actually creating a new body of work as we speak, saying she's 'completely changed everything' as a result of DRAW! 'I'm using a celestial astrological wheel, drawing the symbols that represent the star signs and bringing some animals in.' She has drawn and painted since she was young, sketching boats on the harbour with her 'very talented' artist mother. She would have completed a fine art degree in Sheffield had the Long Blondes not taken off during her final year – even then, she carried on making art for their record sleeves. In fact, she thinks a painting of Diana Dors made in her student bedroom may have helped the band crystalise their aesthetic: a mixture of retro glamour, film and literary references, and spiky guitars. With her neck scarf and beret, Jackson added some much-needed style and intellect to the era's male-dominated indie scene. The band earned a devoted fanbase and wrote one of the defining anthems of the 2000s: the disco-punk single Giddy Stratospheres. But after two albums, guitarist and songwriter Dorian Cox had a stroke and was left unable to play the guitar. The band called it a day. Sign up to Art Weekly Your weekly art world round-up, sketching out all the biggest stories, scandals and exhibitions after newsletter promotion Jackson released a solo album in 2016: the excellent British Road Movies, written with Bernard Butler. But that record's painful gestation convinced her to redirect her attention towards painting. She spent four years refining her style in Rome, and has developed an eye for brutalist landmarks as well as all the motorways and bridges. More recently, though, she has caught the music bug again. During lockdown, and with her then two-year-old son asleep next to her, she found herself messing around with Logic on her iPad and began pushing herself to compose electronic music. Heaven 17's Martyn Ware was impressed with the results and offered to produce them, and a Terry Farley remix of her track Don't Doubt Your Power (recorded under the name Corselette) will hit clubs later this year. It took a while before Jackson could look back fondly on the Long Blondes' time in the spotlight. 'We didn't make Kaiser Chiefs money,' she says with a wry smile. 'But I think [debut album] Someone to Drive You Home still stands the test of time.' And despite the lack of photographic evidence, Jackson knows she had a lot of fun too. 'Oh definitely,' she says. 'In terms of getting to be in a band, that whole period was really the last hurrah.' DRAW! a Landscape with Kate Jackson at
RTÉ News
03-08-2025
- Entertainment
- RTÉ News
Live, Forever: Why bands are reuniting early and often
It's less than two weeks until the Gallagher brothers take to the Croke Park stage as part of the Irish leg of their long-awaited reunion tour – but they're not the only ones on the comeback trail. In the past three years alone we've had Pulp and Blur reunite, as well as Sugababes, JLS, S Club, Blink 182, Busted, My Chemical Romance and Five – which have two shows coming up in the 3Arena later this year. Obviously, reunion tours are nothing new – they've been a feature of the live music scene in one way or another for decades. But the nature – and frequency – of the reunion gig has changed dramatically in a short space of time. In the past a group might have hit the road again as a last hurrah – looking to take the opportunity to pad out the pension fund while they were still able to manage a gruelling tour schedule. And they were less common, too, or incomplete due to band members opting out or passing away before they reached 'farewell tour' age. Nowadays, though, groups seem to be reuniting at a much earlier age. And, far from being seen as a cynical cash-grab, audiences are crying out for a chance to see these comeback kids. Why is this happening? It goes without saying that the artists are, first and foremost, getting back together for the love of the music… their art is what motivates them more than anything else. But it's not being too cynical to point out that there's also an often significant financial incentive to them hitting the road at an earlier stage in their band history. To better explain that, it's worth going back a few decades – and looking at how bands and musicians would have made their money in the 70s, 80s and 90s. Back then making money in the industry was really all about the physical music – single and album sales where what you were trying to drum up. The tour was maybe an add-on – but it wasn't the main event. In fact some cases artists would have made little or no money from their tour, but did so because gigging was a good way to drum up physical sales. The beauty in this model was that, even if you were a band who fizzled out after the first few albums – or gave up touring altogether, you would probably continue to enjoy decent revenues from sales well in to the future. Because you would have new generations of audiences finding your albums years later, And if you needed to boost your bank balance a little you could always push out a special edition, or a 10th or 20th anniversary collectable with a crappy demo bonus track added on, which would sell well on reputation alone. But of course that's all changed now thanks to streaming. Most people don't spend very much money on physical music nowadays. And of the money they do spend on accessing recorded music, very little of it makes its way to the artists. Even acts that are drumming up millions of streams are getting really paltry sums of money from Spotify and Apple Music. That means that touring – as well as merchandise - is now where you go if you want to have any hope of making money as an artist. A report by the Irish Music Rights Organisation last month said that the music industry contributes €1 billion to the Irish economy each year - and €786m of that comes from live events (though it's worth nothing that that spend would include what gig-goers drop on travel, accommodation, food and drink and possibly merch too). The report said consumers spend an average of 1,000 a year on music – and €757 of that goes towards live music. So you can take from that that the vast majority of money that's up for grabs for artists is available to them on the road. And people having money to spend is an important factor in all of this. Because the people who were listening to Five or the Sugababes or My Chemical Romance as tweens and teens are now maybe in their 30s – and there's a good chance they have a bit more disposable income now than they did the first time around. They will be far more willing, and able, to spend a few hundred euro on gigs each year. That means the acts that were popular with young people in the 1990s and 2000s have an opportunity to cash in on that fanbase in a way that wasn't possible when they were at the peak of their popularity. It's suddenly much easier for them to convince their fans to pay through the nose for concert tickets, and still pay €50 for a t-shirt or a poster while they're there. So in a lot of ways the economics of music have been flipped – bands used to tour to promote an album, now they might put out an album to drum up hype for a tour. Although in a lot of cases these reunited bands don't even put new music out... True; and Oasis is the perfect example of that. There's been absolutely no suggestion that they're going to go back into the studio, and it's fair to say that the fans don't care about that. All they want is for the band to finish the tour that they've announced – and ideally add a few more dates on down the line. Now maybe that's because the latter part of Oasis' back catalogue wasn't exactly their best work (those who disagree just need to look at the setlist for the reunion tour to see that Noel and Liam feel the same). However the fact that there's little demand for new music also points to some of the other reasons why these kinds of reunion tours are in such strong demand at the moment. Specifically in the case of Oasis, there's obviously a supply and demand factor. People haven't been able to see them play live together in at least 16 years, so there's a massive pent up demand. Had they stayed on good terms through the years and done a tour every year or two, they might not have seen such a clamour for tickets this time around. That being said, acts like Five, Pulp and Blur have done reunion tours before and are still seeing demand this time around - so having a keen audience is not just about laying low for a few years and then coming back. So what's creating such strong demand for these reunions? The pandemic can take part of the blame – it really super-charged people's FOMO, because people missed out really on a couple of years of gig-going. And now they want to make up for lost time, and mark some acts off their bucket lists. Perhaps another factor is the fact that we're living in a more nostalgic time than has ever been the case before – in part because streaming TV and music has put so much older content at our fingertips. Our smartphones are also, constantly generating photo albums of things we did just a few years ago – which encourages us to get wistful about our younger days which – in turn – makes us pine for the music we listened to at the time. At the same time that instant access to older content has made it much easier for younger people to discover and create a love for music that they were maybe a little bit too young for the first time around. There will no doubt be plenty of people in their late teens and early 20s at the Oasis concerts this month – alongside those who were grown-ups when they first heard Wonderwall. (In fact the demand for tickets from newer fans did spark a brief, nasty debate online which saw some older fans argue that they deserved tickets more than the newcomers (and, particularly, the younger women who wanted to go). So just how lucrative are these kinds of reunion tours? Well it obviously all depends – and there are a lot of factors at play. But it's likely that Oasis will be behind the year's biggest reunion, in financial terms if nothing else. It's estimated that they could be looking at revenues of more than €460m for their current tour – even assuming it is not extended beyond its current 41 date run. Now that is revenue for the whole tour –from that they'll need to cover a lot of costs including venue hire, staging, crewing, transport and so on. However it seems as though there will still be plenty left for the talent when all the bills are covered. The reports are that each of the Gallagher brothers could be walking away with upwards of €50m each – with even more potential income from merch and the inevitable boost to album sales/streams. For other bands it's probably not quite as lucrative – but all the same you'd imagine they could be building up a decent sum of money for themselves To take the example of Five– while they're not playing the same sized venues as Oasis, they are doing 25 nights in venues that are in the 10,000 to 15,000 seater range. Many of those nights are already sold out – or close to being sold out. So even if it's not tens of millions each, you would imagine there is a significant amount of money being generated for the group from their tour.
