KODALINE have been pulling huge crowds to their festival appearances here at home and in the UK and Europe, a spectacular rise in fortunes for the quartet who only formed as Kodaline in 2011 and released their debut EP just one year ago. The band were previously known as 21 Demands and tasted some success in 2007, becoming the first group to top the Irish charts with an independently released track.
Performing as Kodaline the band’s sound has evolved and recording with Steve Harris (producer for Dave Matthews band, mixer for U2) has drawn comparisons to Coldplay and U2 for their bold, epic and stirring music.
The band began 2013 as nominees for the influential BBC’s Sound of 2013 Poll and released their debut album ‘In a Perfect World’ in June, peaking at No. 3 in the UK
The band have had a busy summer on the festival circuit playing Glastonbury, Pukkelpop Festival in Belgium and Lowlands in Holland. They refer to this one saying “One of the best crowds we have ever played to! Thank you guys so much.” Last weekend Kodaline reached another milestone, playing the legendary Reading and Leeds festival. The band arrived on stage to “the loudest crowd we have ever played to thus far.” A packed tent sang along to the band’s hits ‘High Hopes’ and ‘Love Like This’, proving that Kodaline have a resilient universal appeal at a festival where the hip hop and dance acts like Disclosure and A$AP Rocky were pulling the bigger crowds from the indie guitar hopefuls.
The band’s new EP was released this week, ‘Brand New Day’. The release also features acoustic versions of ‘Perfect World’ and ‘Brand New Day’ featuring Nina Nesbitt.
All the recent success has not gone to the musicians’ heads. When Kodaline played Indiependance Festival earlier this month they elected not to use the VIP backstage area and instead set up their tents in the main campsite at Mitchelstown. First and foremost the band are music fans and enjoyed BellX1’s headline set and listened to festival goers sing Kodaline’s hits in the campsite, unaware that the future rockstars were camping right there with them.
Kodaline will play Electric Picnic this Sunday September 1. Limerick Post will be there to report on the gig and the latest from Limerick acts Hermitage Green, Karl Spain and Dermot Whelan. Follow us on Twitter @musiclimerick for updates.
