Shed Seven to headline St Helens’ Eclectica Festival

Jun 24 2008 by Vicky Anderson, Liverpool Daily Post

BRITPOP stars Shed Seven will be the headline act at this summer’s Eclectica Music Festival in St Helens.

The band will be appearing in a free concert on Saturday August 9 in Victoria Square.

Eclectica will be Shed Seven’s first festival appearance since 2001 and is the start of a major tour for the band, which also includes performances at the Edge Festival in Edinburgh, T in the Park and the V Festival.

The band will be delving into their extensive back catalogue and selecting tracks from their best-selling studio albums which gave them a run of 15 consecutive Top 40 hits, including Going for Gold, Chasing Rainbows, Bully Boy, Getting Better, Disco Down and On Standby.

The band line-up will include co-songwriter guitarist Paul Banks in his first festival appearance withShed Seven since 1999. The five-piece band will be completed by all the other original members Joe Johnson, Alan Leach, Tom Gladwin and Rick Witter.

Eclectica is nearly 10 hours of free entertainment that combines festival favourites and flourishing new local talent.

The open-air concert, beginning at noon, is one of the highlights of a calendar of festivals and events taking place in the borough this summer, including the St Helens Festival next week, the Brouhaha Music and Arts festival in July, and the St Helens Comedy Festival in September.

Following Eclectica, music venue The Citadel is hosting an official Eclectica aftershow party featuring a DJ set from Rick Witter of Shed Seven and showcasing up-and-coming local acts.

Tickets for this event are available from The Citadel box office, telephone 01744 735436 or visit www.citadel.org.uk .

Cllr Richard Ferry, executive member for urban regeneration on St Helens Council, says: “Eclectica is becoming a firm favourite on the North West music scene with a reputation for attracting a truly diverse range of music genres and talents so we are thrilled to be able to announce another great headline act for this year’s event.”