Kopek To Tour The World!

Kopek, who had been down to play KilkennyMusic.com in late November were announced the winners of the Global Battle of the Bands in London’s Astoria at the end of last week (sorry I’m a little late to the front page with the news). Profile and sounds of the guys can be found in the Artists Area as always. Read on for more…

And the winners of the GBOB 2005 world final are…

Kopek! From Ireland! National final-winning bands from twenty-four countries around the world took part in The Global Battle of the Bands World Final in a packed-out London Astoria on December 7. With their grunge rock vibe and a hatful of catchy songs and guitar hooks, Kopek were the clear winners according to the panel of judges. It means that the three-piece powerhouse rockers from Dublin have won themselves a world tour and $100,000.

The judges on the night were legendary producer Steve Lillywhite (U2, Rolling Stones, Talking Heads etc); punk pioneer Glen Matlock of the Sex Pistols; music journalist Rhodri Marsden (The Independent); singer/songwriter Kate Havnevik (Royksopp, Moby etc) and Mick Feldman, former head of A&R at Sony Europe who has now started his own record company, Fume

At the presentation, judge Steve Lillywhite declared that “there wasn`t one single band on this stage tonight who didn`t deserve to be there, but there is only one winner in GBOB.” Actually, that`s not strictly true because Drive Like Maria from the Netherlands who came second despite technical problems and The Rise from Scotland who came third, will be flown out with Kopek to play Mexico`s biggest annual festival in Mexico City on April 5 2006.

In fourth and fifth place were TOL from Ukraine and Feliz No Cumpleanos from Mexico respectively, and in joint sixth place were Marius from the Faroe Islands and Building A Better Spaceship from the USA.

The bands taking part, in order of appearance, were:
Misty Mono from Sweden
Mea from Wales
Kopek from Ireland
Feliz No Cumpleanos from Mexico
The Authority from Philippines
Marius from Faroe Islands
The New Brand from Denmark
Live Wyya from Jamaica
Inakin from Australia
Unit 731 from Canada
Lapko from Finland
Ruba Saqer and Ramzi Rais from Jordan
Beinhard from Norway
The Rise from Scotland
Balboa from Spain
Building a Better Spaceship from USA
TOL from Ukraine
Drive like Maria from the Netherlands
Life-N-Joy from Russia
Area 51 from Thailand
Everafta from England
Circle of Grin from Germany
Finnegan from Iceland
Martin Rocka and the Sick Shop