Swansea and Ipswich bands to open the V Festival

Virgin Media has today announced the winners of the Road To V unsigned band competition.

The Last Republic

Underline The Sky

With over 2,600 bands applying for this year’s Road to V, the competition was fierce, but now the much anticipated winners have been revealed:

Welsh rock quintet The Last Republic and pop punk band Underline The Sky, from Ipswich!

This year’s mentors, Just Jack and The Charlatans, whittled the ten semi-finalists down to the final six, but this year it was the public who decided that The Last Republic and Underline The Sky should be the lucky unsigned acts to open the V Festival in Stafford and Chelmsford on 22nd and 23rd August and appear on the same line up as Oasis, The Killers and Snow Patrol.

Read The Charlatans interview on Band Weblogs!

The Last Republic lead singer, Jonnie Owen, commented, “We have been following the Road to V competition for years and it was a dream to enter but to get this far and to know we are going to perform at probably the coolest festival of the summer is untrue. We can’t believe our luck and we just can’t wait to get on stage now and give it our best”

Underline the Sky lead singer, Bronwyn Cooper commented, “We got into this competition through our fans. We have worked so hard to keep their support and attract new fans along the way, and you have no idea how very grateful we are for them. The competition was immense, but the hard work had paid off now and our dream has come true. Bring on V Festival!”

Both bands were recognised for their mesmerising performances at Brighton’s The Great Escape festival where they opened for the Road to V mentors, The Charlatans and Just Jack.

Ashley Stockwell, executive director of brand and marketing at Virgin Media commented: “This year’s Road to V competition was of an incredibly high standard and we were delighted by the sheer number and variety of bands who entered. Our finalists ‘wowed’ our mentors with their performances at The Great Escape and then finally won over the hearts – and ears – of their fans in the public vote. Congratulations to The Last Republic and Underline The Sky – we can’t wait to see their performances at the V Festival.”

Since 2004, Road to V has nurtured great new talent with bands such as quirky post-punk trio The Young Knives, who opened V Festival and went on to attract a Mercury Award nomination in 2007 for their second album ‘Voices of Animals and Men’. Other successful Road to V winners include the critically acclaimed Bombay Bicycle Club, The Rebs and The Brightlights.

To find out more about Road to V, fans can visit www.roadtov.com, where they can watch exclusive interviews, extended shows and performances. Customers on all mobile networks can also keep up-to-date and get access to exclusive video clips on their mobile by texting R2V to 801591.

The Road to V winners will be showcased on Friday 7th August, 2009 at 6:55 pm on Virgin1. As well as being broadcast on Virgin1, the full Road to V shows are available on Virgin Media’s Music On Demand.

A show documenting Underline the Sky and The Last Republic’s experience at V Festival will air on Friday 4th September at 6.55pm.

The Last Republic MySpace

Underline The Sky MySpace

For more information on Virgin Media products and services visit:

Virgin Media

Road to V Official Website

New and unsigned bands are finding it increasingly difficult to get their music heard by the right industry professionals that could really get them the help and advice they need.

Given this, a brand new revolutionary website has been launched with the sole purpose of bridging the seemingly large gap between talented unsigned artists and heavy weight industry decision makers.

The Unsigned Band Review (www.unsignedbandreview.com) has a way for unsigned bands to submit their music to a panel of industry insiders who will provide them with the advice and know-how they need in order to make themselves a more attractive prospect to just these people.

Individuals such as NME Radio’s James Theaker, Kerrang!’s Katie Parsons, Sony’s ex Head of AnR Olivier Behzadi and even Orange Unsigned Judge Simon Gavin are all part of the team, ready to give emerging talent advice on what record labels are looking for.

Advice from AnRs, stylists, producers, promoters and presenters is all just a click away, making this website the central source of information to a growing base of over 5000 bands.

Compared with the 800,000 bands on MySpace still trying to get noticed, the UBR acts as a very useful filter in putting unsigned bands’ music directly in front of people who can help.

On 27 August, 2009, The UBR will hold their very first ‘Demo Drop’ event at The Fly on New Oxford Street, London, giving bands the opportunity to have their demos passed onto each member of the team – with a guaranteed listen.

Bands set to appear live at the event include Leeds’ electro band I Call Shotgun (www.myspace.com/icallshotguntheband) and charismatic indie from Minus IQ (www.myspace.com/minusiq).

NME Radio’s James Theaker will be compeering the whole evening and had this to say:

“Everyone knows that the music business is all about who you know and not what you know, and it’s also about being in the right place at the right time. With the UBR taking over one of London’s premier live music spots it gives unknown bands the perfect opportunity to meet and interact with top industry professionals in an unparalleled one-on-one capacity. Every young band out there is looking for the quickest route from studio to end product – UBR @ The Fly gives them that opportunity, and of course a review on the UBR website which is visited by industry heavyweights day-in day-out.”

Olivier Behzadi added:

“There are so many bands out there who need to get feedback from music industry experts. This is the first of many UBR demo drop nights that will happen in the next year where those who deliver their demo will get feedback from our team of music experts”

Only 150 tickets are available for this event!

Get buying yours now at:

Buy Tickets on Barfly

Bands: For a guaranteed review by our panel and a night of great music make sure you bring along your demo with your name, email, band name, and any specific question that you’d like to ask our reviewers- if you have one that is! Pop your ticket in with the demo and we’ll get our team of pigeons to fly the demos over to UBR HQ for some hardcore review action!

I Call Shotgun MySpace

Minus IQ MySpace

The Unsigned Band Review Official Website

Are you a musician?

Looking for incredible exposure?

Want your stuff played in a national ad campaign?

Samsung is running a hunt for the hottest talent around for its next ad. All you need to do is go to www.f400share.com and upload your music! Whatever you’re into, you can take part – they’ve got a range of different styles you can enter under.

And the best bit is it’s down to a public vote, so all you need to do is gear up enough mates to be in with a chance of winning!

You’d better get your skates on – judging takes place on 20th of June, 2008.

It only takes a few minutes to do, and it could just be the break you were looking for.

Get in on the game:

F400 Share

Out of the bedroom and onto the stage, Red Bull Bedroom Jam is proud to be creating the Camden Crawl’s only venue for 2008 that will also be open to under 18’s on the 18th and 19th April 2008. Expect to see some of the UK’s most talented young bands from both the Red Bull Bedroom Jam network and the Camden Crawl’s esteemed roster.

Red Bull Bedroom Jam is a site that allows young bands and musicians, who would otherwise struggle to get an outlet for their music due to venue age restrictions, to upload their videos and have the opportunity to have one of their gigs live streamed across the Internet, helping them gather that all important fan base.

This month, April 2008, Red Bull Bedroom Jam have an opening for a slot on the Red Bull Bedroom Jam stage at the Camden Crawl and are looking for talented musicians to upload their jam videos to the Bedroom Jam site, one of which will be cherry picked and chosen by the Red Bull judges to play on stage at the event.

The Bedroom Jam site is also a place to discover new talent, so users can submit their votes on which bands they rate are the best.

Latest: Camden Crawl weekend tickets have now sold out but for those under 18, Red Bull will be running a special guest list for access to the Red Bull Bedroom Jam venue.

Details on how to apply for the guest list plus all the above can be found on the official site:

Red Bull Bedroom Jam

Uber.com, in conjunction with A&R Worldwide’s MUSEXPO, Atlantic Records, Peer Music Publishing, Rebel Group/ADA Distribution and The Agency Group, announced the launch of the online music talent search, You Bring The Talent contest.

The winning musician/band will receive:

-An EP deal with Atlantic Records
-A music publishing deal with Peer Music
-A Booking Deal with The Agency Group
-Distribution through ADA from The Rebel Group
-A Showcase at The House of Blues in Hollywood, CA

HOW TO ENTER:

1) Sign up on Uber.com and make sure to check the Musician box on the form (this will allow you to add your music to your page.)

2) Gussy up your page with photos, music, your bio and make it all fancy-like, which is super easy on Uber.

3) Head over to the You Bring the Talent page on Uber and grab the embed code for your Voting Module, so you can pop it on your Uber page, or anywhere else you want people to vote for you.

WHAT TO KNOW:

1) The contest is open until March 31st, 2008 so there’s plenty of time to sign up and get people to vote for you.

2) Your fans can vote ONCE EVERY 24 HOURS. That’s right – all of your friends and fans can vote for you once every day, so let people know at your shows and on your website (where you can definitely put up your Voting Module.)

3) Think about this – If you’ve got 1000 MySpace friends and half of them vote for you three times a week, that’s 15,000 votes. Not too shabby.

4) You can check out the official rules here.

For more information, please visit:

You Bring the Talent Contest on Uber

Uber Official Website

The line up is as follows:

Carmen Sclafani of Wiser Time – 9 PM
www.myspace.com/carmensclafani

Lara Ewen – 10 PM
www.myspace.com/laraewen

Ben Godwin – 11PM
www.myspace.com/karmafarm

Austin Donahue -12 AM
www.myspace.com/firewalkerpro

T.H. White – 1 AM
www.myspace.com/thwhitemusic

W.E. Fest is a five day, totally DIY, volunteer-run extravaganza that always takes place during the week of Memorial Day Weekend.  Despite being small, homespun and intentionally under the radar for the past decade, W.E. Fest has garnered an uncanny reputation for discovering new talent. Lamb Of God, Mae, The Dismemberment Plan, The Mooney Suzuki, Anthony Rossomando from The Dirty Pretty Things, Alison Mosshart from The Kills, Beefcake The Mighty from GWAR, James Hanna from Asobi Seksu, ASG, and many, many others are all W.E. Fest vets.

The first W.E. Fest was co-founded by current Senior Director and underground art punk Kenyata Sullivan in 1996 to showcase genuinely unknown talent and build community within the indie scene. Only small indie label and unsigned bands are allowed to play. Tickets are “intentionally ridiculous” at just $1 a day. This year the festival will make a return to its roots by also featuring films, zines, comics and other DIY arts projects.

Organic Entertainment is a boutique service firm, multi-tiered entertainment group and newly turned record label committed to the big picture growth of independent record labels and recording artists who compete for market share with major labels. With great understanding of the new market leverage of indies, Organic creates unique business models for artists that employ traditional grass roots methods complemented by distinctive communications strategies aimed at penetrating an oversaturated and competitive marketplace. For more information, please visit Organic Entertainment: www.organicentertainment.net or www.myspace.com/organicentertainment.

I have quite an interest in knowing what’s going on in the music industry as well as keeping up with band news and new releases that are coming out. It became difficult for me to keep track of all that is going on in the music world, so I figured the best way would be to have guest bloggers submit their own music news for not only me to read but for their fans and potential new fans to read as well.

There is quite a mix of information here, but the good thing is that it’s all music all the time. By reading some of the band press releases that have come through, music reviews and gig notices, I’ve discovered quite a few new unsigned bands and signed bands that I really like (whether signed to an obscure indie label or a well known record company) that I would never have heard of otherwise. If the guest blogger entry catches my eye, it’s easy to follow the included links to hear the band or artist. With the easy accessibility of the internet and band websites, this has become the most convenient way ever to listen to music. Pretty cool!

To submit guest blogger entries and press releases with images, email: info at bandweblogs dot com

By: Jenny May

To be considered, please visit www.myspace.com/wefestallstars. Send a message with the words “2007 submission” in the title.

WE Fest is a multi-day, totally DIY, volunteer-run extravaganza that always takes place during the week of Memorial Day Weekend. The first WE Fest was co-founded by Wilmington resident and underground punk Kenyata Sullivan in 1996 in an effort to expose underground talent and build community within the independent scene. Only indie-label and unsigned bands are allowed to play. W.E. Fest has garnered a reputation for discovering new talent, finding a larger percentage of winners than any other event in the country, including South by Southwest, CMJ New Music Festival, the annual NEMO festival in Boston, and PMC. Since then, indie bands of all shapes, sizes, colors, and sounds have played this Fest, made friends, and gone home to network, share gigs, keep in touch, and make WE Fest part of their lives.

This year the festival will make a return to its roots by also featuring films, zines, comics and other DIY arts projects.

Past participants include The Dismemberment Plan, Dufus, The Mooney Suzuki, Discount (Alison Mosshart before The Kills), The Selzers (Ryan Gentles before The Strokes), ASG, The Damn Personals (Anthony Rossomando before Dirty Pretty Things), The Waking Hours, Mayflies USA, and many others, all when they were still unsigned.