Two Against The ETEP Field

The latest round of European Talent Exchange Programme results show U.K. acts Baddies and White Lies way ahead of the field, with the rest of the confirmed festival bookings being shared by about three dozen acts from a dozen countries.

“It’s getting interesting because at this stage we’ve never had so many different acts from so many different countries,” ETEP producer Ruud Berends told Pollstar.

Only Switzerland’s Gurten Festival, Denmark’s Roskilde and Sweden’s Hultsfred have booked both Baddies and White Lies, which already has a No. 1 U.K. album under its belt and was a hot tip for ETEP.

Baddies is proving particularly popular in Germany and will be playing Melt, Haldern, Rheinkultur, and Rocko Del Schlako, and will also be Les Nuits Botaniques (Belgium), Oya (Norway) and Provinssirock (Finland).

White Lies will play Rock Am Ring (Germany), Rock Werchter (Belgium), Pinkpop (Holland), Benicassim (Spain), Heineken Open’er (Poland) and Norway’s re-invented Hove Festival, which is now being run by Melvin Benn’s U.K.-based Festival Republic.

The act will also be at California’s Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, the only non-European festival among the 60 signed up for ETEP.
Only half have made their bookings. Although there’s nothing to stop them from making more, the pattern looks set and it’s hard to see the two Brit bands being caught by a late run from the chasing pack.

However, Belgium’s Pukkelpop, Glastonbury (England), T In The Park (Scotland), Italia Wave (Italy), Exit (Serbia), Lowlands (The Netherlands), Paleo Nyon (Switzerland), Nova Rock (Austria) and Sziget (Hungary) are among the major European outdoors that are still considering their ETEP options.

France’s Yuksek is four behind White Lies with five shows, Austria’s Soap & Skin is on four shows, and Buraka Som Sistema (Portugal) and The Asteroids Galaxy Tour (Denmark) have three.