Project - Radiohead Tent Tour
Client
- The Band - Location - Western Europe, 5 countries - Year -
2000
In 2000 Radiohead became the first major band to
undertake a European tour in a tented structure. The Kayam structure is
available exclusively in Europe from Atticbest Ltd and from Rudi
Enos Design world wide.
The tour used three
Kayam structures and took place during the petrol strikes of that year.
The Kayam crew were as always, magnificent - thank lads!
In
September and October 2000 for the first time a chart topping, market
leading rock group undertook a 21 date sell out tour using no
traditional venues, i.e. a portable structure the Kayam
Concert Tent. The band used the Kayam after performing in the structure
on two previous occasions in Wales and Manchester. With a capacity of
10,000, the concert tent version of the structure was perfect for the
tour.
The Magic Kingdom
The band have
been publicly appreciative of the use of this unusual venue, which was
called the 'Magic Kingdom' by one journalist.
Jonny
Greenwood
"As for the tours, Jonny said that they are
bringing along their own tent because they don't want to play in big
venues that are designed for sport and have adverts all over the place.
There will also be better sound and more control over acoustics. And as
for why they are not playing Pinkpop, Colin said that they played
Glastonbury before the release of OK Computer and don't want to play big
festivals before the release of the album this time. Radiohead is in for
a bracing jolt of culture shock when it plays the corporate,
signage-strewn confines of the Air Canada Centre next month.
"
After a summer of outdoor gigging in Europe, the critically
acclaimed Oxford quintet has spent the past two weeks touring Britain in
a custom-made, sponsorship-free, 10,000-seat tent. The initiative,
incidentally, was inspired by No Logo, Toronto writer Naomi Klein's best
selling treatise on the ills of global branding. "It's been kind of
frustrating because we've arrived at venues in Europe and there's been
adverts on beer cups and lorries being parked behind tents with big
adverts on them,'' explained band member Jonny Greenwood during a phone
interview yesterday. ''Being in control of your own venue you can do
what you want. And (the tent) sounds better than a sports
arena."
Ed O'Brien
In one of his diary
entries earlier this year, O'Brien urged Radiohead fans to buy No Logo,
a book by the Canadian journalist Naomi Klein. A brilliant analysis of
the branding of planet Earth by Nike, McDonald's, Starbucks, MTV and
others - and of the activists around the world who are trying to throw
spanners in the works - No Logo was read by three members of the band
and was even rumoured to be a potential title for the new
album.
"No Logo gave one real hope," says O'Brien. "It
certainly made me feel less alone. I must admit I'm deeply pessimistic
about humanity, and she writing everything that I was trying to make
sense of in my head. It was very uplifting."
"It was very
Disney, you could see the lights twinkling away as you walk across the
park." So you control the sound and you control the whole thing? "Yeah
we control everything."