As Paramore And QOTSA Join Line Up, A Look At The Reading And Leeds Headliners
The final headliners for Reading and Leeds have been announced and for the first time ever festival goers will be treated to four headline acts over the weekend. Yes, joining the already announced Arctic Monkeys and Blink 182 is both Queens Of The Stone Age and Paramore, who will share headlining duties. So now we know the full lineup lets take a closer look at this year’s headlining acts.
Last year the Arctic Monkeys unleashed their most commercially successful album to date ‘AM’, not bad for a band who also had the fastest selling debut album in British history back in 2005. Now older, wiser and with a slightly heavier sound, the Arctic Monkeys have become one of Britain’s most successful rock exports. Last month the album was crowned British album of the year at the Brit awards, where the band also took home best British group. New material aside the band are known for always putting on a stellar show, especially on a big festival stage (just look at their performance at last year’s Glastonbury festival). Their Reading and Leeds outing will be the only England and Wales festival appearance of the year and it will mark the first time they’ve performed there since headlining in 2009.
Marking the15th anniversary of their festival debut, Blink 182 will make their fifth Reading and Leeds appearance this year. The band last appeared in 2010 when they were celebrating their comeback. Now the trio, who have been making hits for over twenty years, should have their 7th studio album ready by the time they take to the Reading and Leeds stage. Expect the California punks to treat the festival audience to some new material as well as all their most famous hits. We can already imagine the ‘All the Small Things’ chorus being sung well into the night by festival revellers.
Still touring in support of ‘…Like Clockwork’, Queens of the Stone Age will be sharing headline duties with Paramore. The rock gods are still riding high off the success of their critically acclaimed fourth album. Aside from Reading and Leeds the band will be having a pretty festival heaving summer, appearing across Europe, including at Germany’s Rock AM Ring festival and Denmark’s Northside festival. The band have said they're eager to get back in the studio once they’ve finished touring, so may some new material might be debuted over the August bank holiday weekend. If not the band still have plenty of crowd pleasers to work off from throughout their 18 year career.
Next page: Paramore will be the first female fronted band to headline Leeds/Reading since....can you guess?
Paramore
This year Paramore’s Hayley Williams will become the first front woman to headline a Reading and Leeds stage since Shirley Manson of Garbage back in 1998. Flame haired Williams is of course a fitting successor to Manson as last year she led her pop rockers through their most commercially successful year yet thanks to the release of their self titled album. ‘Paramore’, the album, marked a bit of experimentation for the band, all of which paid off as they topped album charts worldwide. Expect the band to be willing to give their all to the Reading and Leeds crowd as it is the first time they’ve headlined the festival and they’ll have just come off their US tour.
Of course if the Reading and Leeds headliners aren't enough to excite you there’s also plenty more great acts to see over the August bank holiday weekend. Alongside the headliners there’s also Jake Bugg, Vampire Weekend, You Me at Six and Jimmy Eat World on the main stage. Then there’s the NME tent which this year is headlined by The Courteeners, Bombay Bicycle Club and Disclosure.