secret DJ sets to celebrate 10 years of ActionAid at Reading Festival

Enter Shikari, Bombay Bicycle Club, Simian Mobile Disco, and more

By Scott Williams | Published: Tue 16th Aug 2011

Enter Shikari

Friday 26th to Sunday 28th August 2011
Little Johns Farm, Richfield Avenue, Reading, Berkshire, RG1 8EQ, England MAP
£192.50 for a weekend ticket - SOLD OUT, £82.50 - Friday or Saturday
Daily capacity: 90,000
Last updated: Thu 25th Aug 2011

Bollocks to Poverty, the youth arm of anti-poverty charity ActionAid, is staging a series of unpublicised performances in their tent to celebrate 10 years of standing up for the rights of people all over the world at this year's Reading festival.

Enter Shikari
Bands gearing up to deliver a surprise set to remember in the ActionAid tent include Enter Shikari, Bombay Bicycle Club, Simian Mobile Disco, and festival compére Huw Stephens.

There are no running times published, and organisers are leaving fans guessing when the gigs will take place. Lisa Telfer, Events Officer at ActionAid, said, "This year we wanted to treat Reading goers to something really special. I don't want to big it up too much or we might have to close the tent! My tip to fans is to keep popping by the ActionAid tent or look out for clues on Twitter."

Each year the hard-hitting charity has asked the Reading masses to campaign on an issue that is a driving force behind poverty and injustice, and this is the 10th year that Reading festival will say bollocks to poverty.

In 2003, ActionAid waged a war on AIDS. Over 2,800 people at Reading sent messages to their MP, demanding more government funding to fight AIDS worldwide. This resulted in hundreds of MPs writing to the Prime Minister. The UK government put an extra £1.5 billion into the pot towards HIV / AIDS work over the following three years.

Fast forward to 2010 and 3,390 Reading punters posed on the cover of the NMH (No More Hunger) magazine and told Secretary of State for International Development, Andrew Mitchell, to make halving hunger a priority at that year's UN poverty summit. As a result Andrew Mitchell went on camera in support of the campaign and promised to do everything he could to promote food security.

In 10 years 32,000 Reading music fans will have taken part in ActionAid campaigns, 200,000 Bollocks to Poverty stickers and tattoos have been worn (some where the sun don't shine), 3,500 giant Jenga towers have been built by people chilling in Reading's only charity tent and 120,000 people have busted some moves to ActionAid DJs.

ActionAid is offering Reading goers a pre-festival teaser with exclusive personal playlists by Enter Shikari and Radio One DJ Huw Stephens. Go to the Bollocks to Poverty homepage to find out more.

For updates about Reading and the secret sessions fans can follow Twitter @ActionAid_Team or look out for the hashtag #actionaidtent.

The line-up at this year's festival includes headliners My Chemical Romance, The Strokes, and Pulp. Also confirmed are Thirty Seconds To Mars, The Offspring, Deftones, Rise Against, Bring Me The Horizon, New Found Glory, The National, Jimmy Eat World, Madness, Two Door Cinema Club, Seasick Steve, The Pigeon Detectives, The Joy Formidable, Elbow, Interpol, Friendly Fires, Enter Shikari, The View, Frank Turner, Taking Back Sunday, Beady Eye, White Lies, Noah and the Whale, The Vaccines, Metronomy, Patrick Wolf, The Naked & Famous, Jane's Addiction, Crystal Castles, Bombay Bicycle Club, Everything Everything, The Kills, 2manydjs, The Streets, Death From Above 1979, Panic At The Disco, Warpaint, Chapel Club, The Horrors, The Midnight Beast, and Peter Doherty, Mark Thomas, Tim Minchin, Henry Rollins, Lee Nelson, and more.

The festivals will feature a full line-up of over 150 acts over the weekend on six stages. For the line-up details, stage splits, and rumours where available, please click here for Reading and here for Leeds.

AThe twin festivals take place on the bank holiday weekend, from Friday 26th to Sunday 28th August. Reading Festival takes place at Little Johns Farm, Richfield Avenue, Reading, Berkshire, and Leeds Festival takes place at Bramham Park, Leeds, West Yorkshire.

A weekend ticket is priced at £192.50, Friday tickets are priced at £82.50, Saturday and Sunday tickets for Reading have sold out. An early entry (Thursday) ticket is priced at £15, lockers are priced at £15, and a campervan pass is priced at £40. Over 18's wristband will be optional, but allow those that look young to not have to carry ID around all the time.

To buy tickets for Reading from Seetickets - click here.

To buy tickets for Reading Weekend tickets from Ticketline - click here.

To buy tickets from for Reading from Ticketmaster - click here.

To buy tickets for Leeds from Seetickets - click here.

To buy tickets for Leeds from Ticketline - click here.

To buy tickets for Leeds from Gigantic - click here.

To buy tickets for Leeds from Ticketmaster - click here.

Coach travel with combined festival tickets can also be purchased. To buy coach tickets for Reading, or Leeds, click here
.

Children under 13 (12 and under) are admitted free but MUST be accompanied by a ticket holding adult. Please note there is no separate children's area at this event, and eFestivals considers this an event not really suitable for small children.


Latest Updates

Reading Festival 2024
festival details
last updated: Fri 2nd Feb 2024
Reading Festival 2024
line-ups & rumours
last updated: Fri 2nd Feb 2024
Reading Festival 2023
festival details
last updated: Mon 10th Jul 2023
Reading Festival 2023
line-ups & rumours
last updated: Mon 10th Jul 2023