Bob Geldof’s Boomtown Rats to reunite for Isle of Wight Festival 2013

Bob Geldof’s band the Boomtown Rats will perform together for the first time in 26 years this summer at the Isle of Wight Festival. The group, which had a number of punk and new wave hits in the late Seventies and Eighties, will perform on the main stage at the UK music festival on Sunday, June 16, according to an announcement on the festival’s website.

Geldof, the band’s singer, said:

“Playing again with the Rats and doing those great songs again will be exciting afresh. We were an amazing band, and I just feel it’s the right time to re-Rat, to go back to Boomtown for a visit.

“I’ve always fancied playing the Isle of Wight Festival ever since I hitched there in the good/bad days when I was a kid,” the 61-year-old added. “I saw the Who, Doors, Hendrix and Leonard Cohen, who incidentally blew Hendrix off the stage, and Kris Kristofferson, who was also amazing – so many cool bands.

“It will be a privilege to be on that stage, especially with a killer band like the Boomtown Rats.”

The Boomtown Rats formed in Ireland in 1975, and moved to London in 1976, where they became associated with the burgeoning UK punk scene. The band had two number one singles – Rat Trap and I Don’t Like Mondays, in 1978 and 1979 – and three top-ten albums, including the platinum-selling A Tonic For the Troops.

In the mid-Eighties, Geldof became better known for his charity activism – notably his involvement with the Band Aid single, Do They Know It’s Christmas?, released in 1984, and the Live Aid concert, held in July 1985 to raise relief money for the ongoing Ethiopian famine.

In 1986, the Queen gave him an honorary knighthood in recognition of his efforts. The Boomtown Rats split up in the same year, after a final live performance at Self Aid, a charity concert to raise awareness of unemployment in Ireland.

Speaking about the band’s decision to reform, John Giddings, the Isle of Wight Festival’s promoter, said: “It’s great [The Boomtown Rats] have chosen the Isle of Wight Festival as their reunion. Our audience will love them, their catalogue is classic.”

The Isle of Wight Festival 2013 will be headlined by the Stone Roses, the Killers and Bon Jovi. Other acts confirmed for the four-day rock festival include Emeli Sandé, Blondie and Paul Weller.

Last year’s festival, which featured performances by Tom Petty, Pearl Jam and Bruce Springsteen, was marred by treacherous weather, which led to severe traffic jams, flooded car parks and waterlogged campsites.

The Isle of Wight Festival 2013 takes place from June 13-16 at Seaclose Park, Newport.

Source: The Telegraph