Oxegen.html |
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| Oxegen | |
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| Location(s) | Punchestown Racecourse, County Kildare, Ireland |
| Years active | 2004 - present |
| Founded by | |
| Date(s) | July 11 - July 13 |
| Genre(s) | Rock |
| Website | www.oxegen.ie |
Oxegen is an annual music festival, held since 2004, sponsored by Heineken. It was previously called Witnness, which ran from 2000 and was sponsored by Guinness. The event is promoted by MCD. Oxegen was originally a two-day festival but for 2008 was expanded to three days. It takes place at the Punchestown Racecourse in County Kildare, Ireland and has an average attendance of around 80,000 a day, with around 70,000 of these camping on site for the duration, and the rest travelling to the site each day. The festival has attracted attention from outside Ireland, with many of those attending travelling from overseas. 1 Oxegen has also attracted some negative publicity, particularly following the 2006 festival. This is attributed to such factors as the age of admission -17- and easy access to alcohol. 2
As well as the current eight stages of music, there are three large areas for camping which are subdivided by number and the colours blue, red and green - which is the VIP campsite. The backstage and media areas are located in the middle of the site in the buildings normally used to watch the races. Stalls and shops are also provided for festival-goers, as well as toilet and shower areas for campers from 2006 onwards. A Centra store was located in each campsite from 2007 onwards 3 and An Post first appeared at the festival in 2008. 4 The toilet facilities, which had previously been criticised by some as not being adequate for the large number of people at the festival, were improved in recent years.citation needed There is also a funfair adjacent to the arena, featuring a big wheel and other rides, such as the "Magic Carpet", the "Big Drop", and the roller coaster. In 2008, an additional funfair was located in the blue campsite alongside other campsite entertainment such as a circus, silent disco and the Xbox Live Stage. 5 Glass in any form is banned from the festival site and bottle corks, cans and umbrellas are banned from the concert arena. 6
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2004 Festival
Oxegen 2004 took place at Punchestown Racecourse from July 10-11. The Strokes, 7 The Cure, Basement Jaxx, 8 The Darkness, Faithless, Kings of Leon, PJ Harvey, Wu-Tang Clan, 9 The Libertines, Muse, 10 Massive Attack, Keane, 11 Franz Ferdinand, 12 Chemical Brothers, Belle & Sebastian, Scissor Sisters, Elbow, Electric Six, Ocean Colour Scene, The Complete Stone Roses and Cartoon are some of the bands that played at the 2004 festival which took place over five stages. Orbital played their last ever Irish show at the festival, 13 whilst Black Eyed Peas performed in Ireland for the first time in over two years. 14 The Killers, Republic of Loose and Razorlight were among the bands headlining the New Band Stage. Other Irish acts to appear included Ash, The Divine Comedy, Hothouse Flowers, The Saw Doctors, HAL, Snow Patrol, The Devlins, Simple Kid, Maria Doyle Kennedy, Cathy Davey and Bell X1. David Bowie was due to headline the festival but had to pull out due to illness. 15 Kings of Leon's performance was threatened by an incident at Roskilde the weekend before Oxegen when Nathan Followill injured his wrist but, despite the cancellation of a midweek show in Serbia, 16 the band turned up for Oxegen. 17
Tickets sold out a week before the event, having gone on sale on Friday March 5. One-day tickets cost €59.50, two-day tickets were priced at €110.00 whilst a two-day ticket with camping included cost €130.00. 18
2004 Line-up
The main acts that played the festival were:
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Saturday July 10 Main Stage |
 Sunday July 11 Main Stage
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* cancelled due to illness
2005 Festival
Oxegen 2005 took place at Punchestown Racecourse from July 9-10. Green Day 19 and Foo Fighters 20 21 headlined. Also appearing were New Order, 22 Ian Brown, 23 James Brown, The Prodigy, 24 Queens of the Stone Age, 25 The Frames, 26 Keane, 27 Feeder, The Killers, 28 Bloc Party, 29 Kaiser Chiefs, Kasabian, 30 The Bravery, Nine Black Alps, The Departure, Razorlight, LCD Soundsystem, 31 Echo & the Bunnymen, The La's and Snoop Dogg. Irish acts to appear included The Revs, The Saw Doctors, Kerbdog, HAL, Bronagh Gallagher, Humanzi, Director and The Blizzards.
2005 Line-up
For full line-up, see Oxegen 2005#2005 Line-up.
The main acts that played the festival were: [1]
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Saturday July 9 Oxegen Stage |
Sunday July 10 Oxegen Stage |
2006 Festival
Oxegen 2006 took place at Punchestown Racecourse from July 8-9. A limited number of tickets for the festival went on sale a week after the 2005 festival on Friday, July 15. On February 20, the festival was launched and the first acts were officially announced. 32 Tickets went on general sale on Friday March 3 at 8 a.m., with weekend camping tickets priced at €160. This allocation of tickets sold out within 48 minutes. The festival itself encountered bad weather which eclipsed previous records. There were improvements on the Sunday afternoon with sunny skies and a cool, gentle breeze ensuring a decrease in wet festival-goers.
The Who and Red Hot Chili Peppers headlined the festival, the former performing live in Ireland for the first time in 35 years, the latter for the fourth time in five summers. James Brown made his last ever live performance at an Irish festival and Arctic Monkeys their first ever appearance in Ireland. Also appearing were The Strokes, Franz Ferdinand, Kaiser Chiefs, Placebo, Richard Ashcroft, Primal Scream, Editors, Feeder, The Kooks, Kasabian, Sigur Rós, The Feeling, The Futureheads, The Go! Team, The Automatic, Paolo Nutini and Lily Allen. Irish acts to appear included Bell X1, Damien Dempsey, Republic of Loose, Director, The Marshals, Sharon Shannon, The Blizzards, The Divine Comedy, Gemma Hayes and Humanzi.
Security arrangements were criticised as being poor by some sections of the media. The camp-site was not free from trouble troublesome, with reports of tent-burning and an alleged stabbing on the Sunday night/Monday morning of the festival. In the Green Room a considerable leak allowed rain into the enclosed marquee. There were 225 arrests for drugs (with 13 charged for possession with intent to supply), one alleged rape, 33 and the Evening Herald reported that around 250 people were treated for alcohol and drug abuse. When 40 people were sent to Naas General Hospital, fears were raised of a bad batch of ecstasy, but no evidence of such a batch was found. A number of media outlets were threatened with legal action on their coverage of Oxegen 2006 in its aftermath. These included the Irish Independent and boards.ie, where all discussion of MCD events and venues was banned.
2006 Line-up
For full line-up, see Oxegen 2006#Stages.
The main acts that played the festival were:
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Saturday July 8 Main Stage |
Sunday July 9 Main Stage |
2007 Festival
Oxegen '07 took place at Punchestown Racecourse from July 7-8. The Live Earth concerts occurred around the world on the same day as the Saturday of Oxegen 2007. Tickets went on general sale at 8 a.m. on Friday March 2 2007. These sold out in under seventy minutes. The price of a day ticket rose to €96.50, a weekend ticket cost €177.50, whilst the price of a weekend ticket plus camping this year rose to €197.50 (roughly the same price as a three-day Electric Picnic ticket), as compared to €160 in 2006. As in 2006, it was possible to purchase four weekend camping tickets together and receive a free car parking ticket. As with previous years, a number of pre-sale tickets without the price increase went on sale in November 2006.
The headliners were Muse and The Killers. Also playing the festival were Arcade Fire, Scissor Sisters, Razorlight, Bloc Party, Daft Punk, Kings of Leon, Brian Wilson, Interpol, The Kooks, Mika, My Chemical Romance, Avril Lavigne, Queens of the Stone Age, The Goo Goo Dolls, Editors, Klaxons, Maxïmo Park and The Fratellis. Irish acts that played included The Blizzards, Director, The Thrills, The Coronas, David Kitt, Delorentos, Dirty Epics and Sinéad O'Connor. Amy Winehouse pulled out at the last minute 34 whilst The Immediate split up on the same day that they were announced. 35
2007 Line-up
For full line-up, see Oxegen 2007#2007 Line-up.
The main acts that played the festival were: [2]
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* denotes cancelled performance |
2008 Festival
Oxegen '08 was a three day event 36 a first for the festival. It took place from Friday July 11 until Sunday July 13 at Punchestown Racecourse in Naas, County Kildare. Presale tickets went on sale at 08:00 on Friday November 30, 2007 at a cost of €197. Actual sale tickets went on sale at 08:00 on Friday March 7, 2008 but failed to sell out until May 7. 37 38 Extra tickets went on sale on June 20 in “a move to combat touting”. 39 40
Kings of Leon were the first band to be announced on November 27, 2007 at 17:00. 41 42 They headlined the opening night of the festival. 43 On February 15, 2008, R.E.M. were confirmed for Oxegen 2008, headlining the Saturday night. 44 45 On February 19 at 16:29, Kaiser Chiefs, The Raconteurs and Ian Brown were announced on the official website 46 47, followed by The Fratellis, Interpol and Counting Crows the next day 48. The Chemical Brothers and Justice were amongst those added on February 21, 49 50 whilst on February 22, Rage Against the Machine were the last of the headliners to be confirmed. 51. On Sunday February 24, The Verve were confirmed on the official website for an appearance at Oxegen 2008, performing last on the Main Stage on the Saturday. In the following months more bands were announced including Stereophonics,52 The Prodigy, 53 Panic at the Disco, The Feeling, 54 Editors, Kate Nash, Bowling for Soup, The Hoosiers, Newton Faulkner, Scouting for Girls, The Zutons, Battles, 55 56 The Wombats, The Subways, Ben Folds, The Stranglers, Amy Macdonald, Alphabeat, Amy Winehouse, 57 The Pogues, The Charlatans, The Swell Season, 58 Manic Street Preachers, Echo & the Bunnymen, The Ting Tings, Black Kids, MGMT, The Kooks, Groove Armada, The National, Tricky, The Go! Team, Feeder, The Pigeon Detectives, The Enemy and One Night Only. 59 Irish performers to play the festival included The Blizzards, Republic of Loose, Róisín Murphy, Bell X1, Mundy, Aslan, Paddy Casey, The Coronas, The Saw Doctors, The Kinetiks, Dirty Epics, Declan O'Rourke, Delorentos, Future Kings of Spain, Concerto For Constantine, God Is an Astronaut, The Script, Fight Like Apes, Codes and Oppenheimer.
2008 Line-up
For full line-up, see Oxegen 2008#Stages.
The main acts that played the festival were: [3]
