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  • 6 June 2008

Student selected for Glastonbury showcase


Tim and the Fox Cubs performing at a recent gig

Tim and the Fox Cubs performing at a recent gig

Philosophy student Tim Baggott rounded off his final exams at Sussex in style - by landing a gig at top music festival Glastonbury with his band, the Fox Cubs.

Tim celebrated finishing his studies at Sussex on May 28 and woke next day to the news that his band had been selected to play on the BBC Introducing Stage on Friday 27 June - the first day of the three-day music fest.

The Fox Cubs will be joined by 22 other up-and-coming unsigned bands from around the UK, and will be rubbing shoulders with living legends and the current top names in pop. Headline acts include Jay-Z, Amy Winehouse, Leonard Cohen, Kings of Leon, Groove Armada, Neil Diamond, the Futureheads, the Verve, the Wombats and the Zutons.

The band was chosen to play by a panel of judges including Gary Lightbody from chart-topping indie band Snow Patrol and Caspar Llewellyn-Smith, editor of Observer Music Monthly.

Tim says: "It's absolutely wonderful to have been asked. Myself and James [Johnson, Fox Cubs guitarist] have never been and were intending to go this year. The fact that we are now going to be playing is really exciting. Hopefully it'll help us find another foothold in the industry."

Rehearsing a new band while tangling with the intellectual intricacies of Hegel, Wittgenstein and the like proved a formidable challenge for Tim in the final year of his degree: "I had a few difficult moments meeting deadlines, but I think it would have been worse if Sussex didn't have such a calming atmosphere. I also have a great bunch of friends who told me to 'get over myself' and forced me to revise."

The Fox Cubs, a five-man band from Newbury in Berkshire and fronted by Tim on lead vocals, was formed only last summer. Since then, they have enjoyed some notable successes, including a live recording session for BBC Radio 1 at the BBC's famous Maida Vale studios and headlining on Radio 1 DJ Steve Lamacq's stage at London music festival the Camden Crawl.

Now that his studies are over, Tim will be focusing on his music career. The band have just completed their first ever tour, supporting Pull Tiger Tail, which included a gig at Brighton's Engine Rooms, just two days after Tim finished his exams. The band has recorded and released a debut single, 'Beasts Of England', with another, 'You Never Learn', to follow in the near future.

The band's musical influences include Mew, Oceansize, Interpol and Kings Of Leon, while Tim is currently revisiting the back catalogues of Seventies and Eighties bands such as The Cars and Echo and the Bunnymen.

But has philosophy played a hand when it comes to writing winning lyrics? Tim says: "I suppose it could have on a subconscious level, but I think to try to work any of it in would result in something horribly pretentious. I'll never tell you what the lyrics mean, anyway."

  • Four Sussex graduates feature in the six-man line up of Two Spot Gobi, who will be playing their individual brand of pop at venues in Brighton and the West Country this summer. The band is unsigned but has been building a reputation through gigs and music downloads on the internet. Could their new single, Sunshine Lady, be one of the sounds of the summer? You can judge for yourselves at: http://www.myspace.com/twospotgobi

Notes for editors

For information about the Introducing Stage at Glastonbury, see: http://www.bbc.co.uk/glastonbury/2008/lineup/

For more information about the Fox Cubs, see www.myspace.com/foxcubs

University of Sussex Press office contacts: Maggie Clune and Jacqui Bealing. Tel: 01273 678 888 or email press@sussex.ac.uk

 

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