Rock the City 2011 is an ambitious project, a festival that brings to Romania some of the biggest and best rock bands of all times, said Marcel Avram, the man that brought to Romania names such as Michael Jackson, Metallica. The festival has been officially launched on april 5, after a very busy press conference. The ears of all journalists presents there at the conference have been tickled when names such as The Prodigy, Judas Priest, Whitesnake, Papa Roach, Mike and The Mechanics, Therapy, Hatebreed were announced as the line-up of the festival.
After the initial confirmation of the locations as Piata Constitutiei, the Rock the City Festival was moved to ROMEXPO, the same place where Sonisphere Fest took place last year.
The three days of the festival will keep the people busy with parties organised by the sponsors, and all sorts of surprised.
Some of the bands are a premiere for Romania. Papa Roach, for example, is visiting Romania for the first time.
The third edition of the festival, comes after a 1 year break. The last edition of the festival has brought to Romania bands such as Saga, Queensryche and Lipm Bizkit, and it was held at Arenele Romane. As the need for good and powerful rock music has becaome bigger and bigger, the festival has been moved to a larger arena, in order to accomodate the crowds that will flock to mingle with the stars.
The first names that were confirmed for the festival were Judas Priest – promoting their last world tour, and Whitesnake – promoting their latest album „Forevermore”.
Even if Rob Halford, the lead singer from Judas Priest, has announced that the „Epitaph World Tour” is going to end the prodigious and the prolongue carreer of the group, Glenn Tipton, the guitar player gives some hope to the millions of fans outhere and announces that definettly, Epitaph is not going to mean the end of the band and of the worlwide tours. Presently, the band works to a new material, and if the band is to play, they will play in smaller tours. Halford & Co. have chosen their bands name after a Bob Dylan`s song, „The ballad of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest”, from the album „John Wesley Harding”. Along the ages, Judas Priest has launched 16 studio albums and sold over 40 million disks. Their newest album is „Nostradamus” (2008), and it has reached the 11th place in the Billboard Chart 200.
Also Whitesnake returns to Romania, for a concert in Bucharest. Their Bucharest performance is part of their worldwide promotional tour „Forevermore”, album that was launched in Europe on march 25th. Their first single disk from this album was „Love Will Set You Free” and it also comes with a video. This newest album was produced and arranged by David Coverdale, Doug Aldrich and Michael McIntyre in the Snakebyte and the Grumblenott Studios & Villas in Nevada and California.
Whitesnake is a british rock band that started in 1977 in North Yorkshire), with David Coverdale (ex Deep Purple) as lead singer. The guy is so good in what he is doing, that a lot of voices have said that in fact, Whitesnake is only accompanying David Coverdale and nothing else. VH1 has nominated the band to occupy the 85 position in the Best HardRock Bands of All Times Chart. The first formula of the band brought together names such as David Coverdale, Bernie Marsden, Micky Moody, Neil Murray, David „Duck” Dowle and Brian Johnston, at keyboards, to be soon after misplaced by Jon Lord, from Deep Purple. Their first album was not so succesful, „Whitesnake” being launched in 1977, in a time when punk music was rulling the charts. The newest album, „Forevermore”, was described as having no boundaries, being melodic and full of passion in the same time.
This album has been recorded in a new formula, Aldrich being the only surviver from the origibal crew. In Bucharest, Coverdale will share the stage with Doug Aldrich – guitars, Reb Beach (Alice Cooper) – guitars, Brian Tichy (Ozzy Osbourne, Billy Idol) – drums and Michael Devin (Kenny Wayne Shepherd) – bass.
This month, in june, after the long performances in USA, Whitesnake will play in Europe, in Russia, Norway, Sweden, UK, Italyu, Switzerland, Belgium, Germany, The Cech Republic, Austria, Serbia, Romania, Bulgary and Turkey.
The tickets are sold exclusively through Eventim.ro and can be bought in the following shops Germanos, Orange, Vodafone, Domo, Humanitas, Cărturești and online on www.eventim.ro.
The tens of thousands of people that will go to the festival will enter the Festival area starting with 2 p.m. in each day of the festival, and the live performances are to start at 5 p.m.
Vlad Piriu
TheBEATFucker - The Party Rocker