For the past few weeks the Vans Newcomers Search in association with Clash magazine has been on the hunt to find two bands to play on the Vans Off the Wall stage at the Relentless Boardmasters.
The final took place at the Relentless Garage in London on Thursday with an atmosphere as tense as JLS going up against Alexandra Burke - but thankfully without Simon Cowell!
Four semi finalists chosen by representatives from Vans, Clash magazine and SW1 Production went head to head at the live gig. The order of play was random and first up were Cartel. Keen to win the popular vote, they bought a fair few fans with them and kicked off the proceedings. With 30min sets allocated to each band, they didn’t hang around and quickly got their fan base rocking out to their tunes. The Tupolev Ghost played the second slot and hit us hard with heavy riffs and even heavier vocals taking emo back to where it was 10 years ago – and should have stayed. Third up were The Spires who had the whole crowd moving to their mix of indie rock, electro synths and catchy pop melodies. Finally Youves took to the stage and engaged the crowd as they left the stage dotting themselves around the room to engage with the by now merry and raucous crowd.
The judges were so impressed with all four bands that as soon as the public vote was in they quickly huddled together to hatch a plan to invite all four bands to play at the Relentless Boardmasters.
Cartel will support Gentlemen’s Pistols at the Vans after party on Thursday 6th August at Koola bar.
Youves will open up the Vans Off the Wall stage on Friday 7th August and The Tupolev Ghost will open up the Saturday.
The guys from Relentless were so impressed with The Spires that they invited them to play the Relentless stage on Friday 7th at the music festival.
Thanks goes out to Relentless, Sports Vision, Clash magazine, Cartel, The Tupolev Ghost, The Spires and Youves.
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