A THRILLING line-up of 'retro' bands and artists has been announced for the Bilbao BBK Festival – one of the biggest international dates on music-lovers' calendars and which should have been under way about now.
The Pet Shop Boys in 2013 - by then, it was around a quarter of a century since the duo were a permanent top 40 chart fixture in their native Britain (photo: The Sound Stage/Wikimedia Commons)
The 2020 and 2021 editions were called off due to the pandemic, but tickets will be on sale in a few weeks' time for July 2022, which is expected to be very much worth the wait.
As music festival and other major concert entries tend to start selling months in advance, anything up to a year, the main performers will normally be announced with considerable notice to ensure their fans get their places booked.
The huge Basque Country entertainment session will now take place between Thursday, July 7 and Saturday, July 9, 2022, inclusive – three days of back-to-back gigs with a camping ground.
Already, a number of established and up-and-coming national groups and solo artists have been announced for the next edition, including Bomba Estéreo, BICEP Live, Caribou and Slowthai.
For children of the '80s and teens and young adults of the '90s, their formative years may well have been set to a soundtrack that included The Pet Shop Boys – from their earlier hits such as West End Girls, Money, What Have I Done To Deserve This (featuring Dusty Springfield) through to their later, more electro-pop Introspective album with its trademark rainbow-coloured cover, the voice of Neil Tennant is instantly distinguishable and his and Chris Lowe's style has largely failed to be reproduced faithfully by any band or duo since; from Pet Shop Boys to Poster Boys for Bilbao BBK, fans will get the chance to see them live again for the first time in decades.
Bilbao BBK Festival's third annual edition, in 2008 (photo: Carthesian/Wikimedia Commons)
The same age group may have woken up to their radio alarms with the edgy lyrics and indie beats of Placebo – the band that believed They Don't Care About Us will find that is far from the case next July when hundreds of fans are glued to their every note in Bilbao.
Also on the indie front, Supergrass are certain to live up to the first two syllables of their name next summer in the Basque port city, where they have been confirmed as a certainty on the programme.
Are We Human, Or Are We Dancers? Is a question The Killers have not yet managed to answer since this existential doubt of theirs topped the charts in 2009; their fans are likely to be more the latter, as they will see from a stage-eye view in Bilbao in July 2022.
In a recent tweet the festival organisers (@bilbaobbklive) said: “We are continuing to negotiate with all the others and there will be new and major additions.”
These 'others' are not yet known, but the full programme will be announced at the end of this summer.
For a full calendar of Spain's music festivals, their locations, approximate dates and calibre of artists normally seen at them, take a look at our article here.
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