Babyshambles

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Leeds Festival 2005

Friday 26th to Sunday 28th August 2005
Bramham Park, Leeds, West Yorkshire, LS23 6ND, England MAP
£125 for weekend (including camping) - SOLD OUT, £60 for any day

Daily capacity: 55,000

When I heard that Babyshambles were going to play at the Leeds festival, I thought that despite the fact I know nothing about them I should go and see how different they are to Pete's previous band The Libertines (which I used to adore).

Now Pete Doherty has had an incredible amount of publicity surrounding his path to self destruction. Upon arriving at The Nme/Radio One stage it was rammed full to the rafters with people wanting to catch a glimpse of Pete as he works his way towards the bottom of a downwards spiral!

At first I thought I must be the only one in the tent who doesn’t know any songs by Babyshambles, so I asked a few of the other members of the audience if they could tell me some names of songs by Babyshambles. Believe it or not, none of the people I asked could name any songs, in their own words they were watching Babyshambles out of ‘morbid curiosity’.

When Pete finally made it to the stage he was given an incredible heroes welcome, however it wasn’t long before his behaviour turned ugly with him using his mike stand to hit one of the photographers.

I could hardly understand any of the words Pete was singing, and even if I had known some material by Babyshambles I probably wouldn’t have recognised it live anyway because of how bad he was.

Despite what I think, I must acknowledge the fact that the crowd absolutely loved the set even if it was for all the wrong reasons and fair play to Pete for gaining an incredible amount of publicity for being out of control.

One can only hope that Pete Doherty manages to pull himself back together before it really is too late!