蜜芽传媒

Whether just starting out and playing the upstairs of a pub, or headlining their first big show in one of its many iconic venues, almost all touring bands have played Camden at some point in their career. So much so that's it's become something of a rite of passage for acts based in - or passing through - London.

Ahead of 6 Music Festival in Camden (6-8 March), we asked some of the artists on the bill about their own Camden memories - and what the area means to them.

• Find the 6 Music Festival 2020 line-up and event info here

Please note: “Unfortunately, due to illness and on medical advice, Michael Kiwanuka has had to pull out of his UK tour and his 6 Music Festival performance at the Roundhouse on Friday night. Everyone at 6 Music wishes him a swift recovery. More information about Friday night’s amended line-up will follow”

For Michael Kiwanuka "Camden is somewhere that definitely has a big place in my heart", and understandably so, given that he spent a decade living in the area when he was first starting out as a musician. "That's where I lived when I first got a record deal and [played] my first few gigs - I played all the little bars and open mic nights around Camden."

For musicians Camden has everything you really need, he says: "When I lived there, I just never really left the borough. I just stayed there. You didn't really need to leave. You had the best pubs, musicians were always around."

How does it feel to headline such an iconic venue as Camden's Roundhouse? It "feels great", Michael says. "Any classic venue I play, I always look for pictures of legendary acts that have played there." Well, he's in good company, with the likes of Pink Floyd, The Doors, Jimi Hendrix, David Bowie and Bob Dylan all having graced the Roundhouse stage.

Poet/MC Kate Tempest will be playing the Roundhouse on the Sunday night of 6 Music Festival and, like Michael Kiwanuka, she's also very much looking forward to it - and has her own personal link to the venue.

"I love playing in Camden and the Roundhouse is such a great place, historically for poetry. Loads of young poets come through there and my first play, ‘Wasted’, was put on there, so I have a real attachment to that venue.”

“The greatest thing about live music is the possibility it provides for connection," she adds. "I believe that that live music creates an environment for connection that can be an antidote to numbness and what’s required of us to survive the times that we live in.”

Camden's always a place that Anna Meredith looks forward to visiting - whether it's for a concert or not (she saw Dirty Projectors there a few years back and it was "amazing").

She says: "I really like Camden. It's somewhere I used to visit when I came to London as a student and still feels like it's an area with loads of energy which is always evolving without losing its character."

The first time Meredith played in Camden, however, was "a total nightmare". She explains: "Got halfway through my set and the DJ pulled my sound off mid-track to pop on ‘I Wanna Sex You Up’ for a braying hen do…. Fortunately this was a gig low point, [it's been] only up from there."

We're sure her set at 6 Music Festival will go a whole lot smoother.

Radiohead's Ed O'Brien not only plays Camden for the first time as a solo artist at 6 Music Festival, but it's actually his UK solo debut too. For Ed, Camden's "all about the music and the market - goths, rockers and roadmen".

He remembers Radiohead's first ever Camden gig and, like Anna Meredith's experience, it didn't all go to plan. "[It was at the] World's End pub, opening for [US band] Magnapop." Travelling south from a gig the night before in Kidderminster, the band's van broke down on the way to Camden.

The hectic journey may have impacted their performance too, with Ed saying: "I think we were pretty s**t that night." But they were feeling "spirited" nonetheless because they were opening a band who, like their heroes REM, hailed from Athens, Georgia ("So they probably met them"). "We were opening for a US band in London, so all was well.... Onwards."

Sports Team have very vivid Camden memories: both as musicians and punters. The highlights? Seeing Odd Future at Camden Crawl (the stage got mobbed by fans and Tyler, the Creator "stage-dived onto cement with a broken arm"), their first Camden show at Lock Tavern (when they "set up candles round the stage") and closing down the street outside the Dublin Castle due to the lengthy queue to get in to one of their after-shows.

Here's to their 6 Music Festival set joining such an illustrious list.

The Selecter's Pauline Black says Camden played a pivotal role in the formation of the 2-Tone legends, explaining: "Camden was the first area of London that The Selecter really got to know back in 1979. Our PR company was situated almost adjacent to Camden tube, above a shoe shop that sold Doc Martens and mod style loafers. All our initial important decisions concerning the band were decided there, so Camden became like a second home to us in the early days."

"Camden always feels so alive, multicultural and filled with vibrant creative spirit," Black adds. Recalling the first time the band played in Camden, she says: "Electric Ballroom was the first big London show we performed at, supporting The Specials. Madness were also on the bill and all three bands could be seen for the princely sum of £3... Needless to say it was mostly disorganised chaos and mayhem."

Black witnessed another very special Camden moment in 1983, attending Madonna’s first London gig at the Camden Palace (now Koko): "I don’t recall there being many people present that night, but it was obvious that she was a star of the future."

For Squid, Camden will always bring back memories (fond or otherwise) of "being a badly dressed teen... Camden was a haven for awkward teen fashion, fake band t shirts, neon fingerless gloves and fake DMs [Dr. Martens]."

But, like Sports Team, they have big gig memories associated with the area too - both as artists ("We played our biggest show at the Roundhouse supporting Metronomy so it’ll always mean quite a lot") and as fans (standouts including "Herbie Hancock, Radiohead, Neutral Milk Hotel and East India Youth, all at the Roundhouse.")

Despite hailing from New Orleans, Hot 8 Brass Band are pretty familiar on Camden's long-lasting legacy and "how it served as a developing ground for acts like Amy Winehouse." They say: "It’s been a major part of London music culture coming up through the past few decades, providing venues for talents and musicians."

They have their own Camden memories too, recalling how during one soundcheck for a Roundhouse performance they decided to record a "short freestyle dedicated to the popular UK chicken restaurant, Nandos, while we walked expressing fondness for menu items like Piri Piri hot sauce and the whole chicken roaster."

For Ghostpoet, it's Camden's "rich music heritage which has influenced so many artists of yesteryear and today" that makes it such a unique place.

He lists among his favourite gigs "Radiohead at the Roundhouse, Flying Lotus at Koko, Bo Ningen at Dingwalls," and recalls "flashbacks of stumbling drunk down Camden High Street after another amazing musical experience somewhere and feeling very alive. Good times."

Good times indeed.

Like many of the 6 Music Festival acts, the first time Warmduscher played Camden really sticks in the mind (if not for the wrong reasons).

"[It was] with Black Daniel at the Barfly. There was about 10 people in the audience, like the Sex Pistols scene in 24 Hour Party People, only none of them went on to form bands and change the world."

The most memorable gig the band have attended though? That goes to the raucous Fat White Family at the Purple Turtle.