Biffy Clyro for Leeds Festival

So, tonight, another announcement was made regarding Leeds festival. I tuned into Zane Lowe's show to hear them announce it live, but it was pretty obvious as so many rumours have been flying about for the past few days.

Biffy Clyro are the second headliner, along with Eminem. Eminem is a massive, strong headliner, and as much as I respect Biffy as a band and think they are good.. to me they don't feel like headline material. Headliners tend to have a much wider appeal, and have at least a few songs that everyone there is gonna know and love. I don't know that many Biffy Clyro songs, and I don't think a lot of festival goers will either. I know 'Many of Horror', aka 'When We Collide' which the X-factor ruined. I know 'Mountains', and maybe one or two others. I think they'd be a great sub-headliner to a much bigger rock band - someone like Foo Fighters or Muse from previous years.

It's also got me thinking about the third headliner. Hopefully they're saving the best till last, although Eminem seems to be the big shock of the year, so i don't know. I'm praying they haven't blown their budget on Eminem, meaning they have to settle for 2 sub-par headliners. The strongly rumoured bands are Blur, Arctic Monkeys, Black Sabbath.. personally, I don't think Sabbath belong at this festival. As much as they are a classic band, they just don't fit in with the general feel of the festival, and most Leeds goers wouldn't really want to see them particularly. Blur would much better fit in, however I've recently come to the epiphany that they're slightly over-rated, and apart from a few songs, I'd be a bit bored through their set. I would love Arctic Monkeys to headline as I haven't seen them live since November 2011. They also are reportedly working on a new album, but I don't think it'll be finished by the time the festival comes round, so I'm not sure whether they would headline. They did headline it fairly recently as well.. 2009 I think. Mumford and Sons are also rumoured - a band who I really dislike and will be more than pissed off if they are announced. They are sub-headliner at best, and still one I probably wouldn't see. I think they'd better suit headlining a smaller stage. If I could pick any headliner, it would be Red Hot Chilli Peppers, however i don't think it'll happen - apart from the general buzz that goes round every year, there are no strong rumours.

There were 5 other artists announced today: Jake Bugg, Foals, System of a Down, Bring Me The Horizon and the newly reformed Fall Out Boy. All in all, a pretty good announcement i'd say. I was kinda disappointed when Biffy were announced, so for 'Chop Suey' to be playing 5 minutes later.. well, I was more than excited. System of a Down are a quality band, and I am extremely excited to be seeing them live. They're definitely the act I'm most excited for out of all that were announced today. I'm also quite excited for Fall Out Boy - a band I used to love when I was about 12, It'll be a real nostalgic set to watch. Songs like 'Dance, Dance' and 'Sugar, We're Going Down' were the soundtrack of my Emo days. If they don't clash with anyone, I might go and see BMTH, just because again they're a band I used to love. Jake Bugg'll be nice to see too, if he doesn't clash with anyone. I like a few of his songs but he's a great artist and I'd love to see him live, I think there'd be a great atmosphere. I've never listened to Foals really, but I wasn't impressed by what I heard on the radio.

Overall, I think today was a pretty good announcement. After the initial disappointment of Biffy Clyro headlining, announcing Fall Out Boy who have only just announced their reformation today, as well as Jake Bugg and System of a Down, well, it's really got me excited. Bring on Leeds Festival 2013.

Sheftival 2012: Saturday 4th August

Words cannot describe how excited I was when I was told about Sheftival. I'd never heard anything about it, then my mate said 'oi raven, Toots and the Maytals are playing sheffield in a couple of weeks'. I couldn't believe it! Toots is a bloody legend, he is credited with inventing the word Reggae in the song Do The Reggay, he's one of the pioneers of reggae. To find out he's playing not far from me for only a tenner, was amazing! Couldn't miss it. There was loooads of people on the line-up, but I only went for Toots, and The Selecter.

I was very hungover from the night before - this was the day after the Skints, and I only ended up getting a couple of hours sleep anyway - so i almost, almost considered not going. But, I put Toots + the Maytals on the stereo, and it gave me the strength to power through my hangover and get the bus into town. I met Max and Alex, and we got the best hangover cure there is:

More Beer. Which quite frankly made me feel extremely ill, along with the train shaking about. But I just about managed 2 or 3. Anyway, we arrived at Don Valley Bowl where the festival was, about 6 o clock. It was the first time i'd been to DVB since the Arctic Monkeys homecoming gig last year (which was probably the best gig of my life).

It was weird seeing The Selecter. I saw them when I was about 3 years old, and it's probably my earliest memory. I remember being held by my mum whilst they were on stage - I don't remember the music, I just remember it being them. So to see them live nearly 15 years later was pretty weird! They managed to get the crowd going pretty well - lots of old Skinheads were skanking! A couple of people were definitely off their head aswell, haha. Their set was only short, 40 minutes at the most, but It was good. James Bond was probably the highlight of the set, along with On My Radio and Too Much Pressure.

After their set, we made it over to the Juju World Music stage. Macka B was on the stage, someone i'd never heard of, but was pretty good. He sang a song about what food he liked to eat, which was bizarre but pretty funny. There was a pretty long wait between Macka B and Toots, so we sat down for a bit and chilled. When he finally came on.. it was so so so so so good. He opened with Pressure Drop, which is a beautiful song!! One of my favourite Reggae songs ever. His set included the classics Monkey Man (famously covered by the Specials), 54-46 Was My Number, Louie Louie, Funky Kingston and many more. It was a great set and i'm so happy I can now say I've seen both The Wailers and Toots + The Maytals live. Arguably the 2 biggest reggae artists ever!