The mighty Metro Weekender returns to a festival field near you this August Bank Holiday Weekend as we build on the success of 2006 in London and Cardiff. Metro Weekender London (Clapham Common) brought the roof down for a 3rd year in a row, with both days selling out right across the board – 40,000 in total, plus over 5,000 people were turned away from South West Four alone!! Metro Weekender Cardiff meanwhile launched in spectacular style on the beautiful backdrop of Coopers Field, Bute Park with both events selling out their 10,000 tickets per day and the weekend as a whole being greeted with a glowing nod of approval from the Cardiff community. The Metro Weekender has quite rightly established itself as one of the UK’s most essential weekend festivals since its inception in 2005. Split across two days (in both cities), dance all-dayer South West Four brings you the biggest DJs on the planet, whilst the Award-winning indie-dance day Get Loaded in the Park (London) and Cardiff Calling (Cardiff) provide the rock n’ roll swagger. Highlights across the 4 one-day festivals last year included banging sets from Carl Cox, Paul Oakenfold, John Digweed, Pete Tong and Armin Van Buuren at the two South West Four shows, with the likes of Pete Doherty’s Babyshambles, Snow Patrol, De La Soul, Lily Allen, Jamie T, Guillemots, Tiga and Erol Alkan entertaining the masses at Get Loaded in the Park / Cardiff Calling. Based on the overwhelming success of 2006, the Metro Weekender later received a record-number of nominations at the UK Festival Awards - 9 in total. These were for: Get Loaded in the Park - Best One Day Festival, Best New Festival and Innovation Award… Cardiff Calling - Best One Day Festival and Best New Festival… South West Four London - Best Medium-To-Large Festival and Best One Day Festival… finally South West Four Cardiff - Best One Day Festival and Best New Festival.

Like a good wine, the Metro Weekender 2007 will just keep on getting better with age! We’ve seen what works and what doesn’t, tweaking all the best bits to ensure that this year’s events in London and Cardiff will live long in the memory. On the whole, our commitment to work alongside the local community (in both cities) will continue even more so this year as we look to emulate the success of 2006’s awe-inspiring Metro Weekender and cement its place in the festival history books. Please note: demand for tickets is enormous, so please get in there fast and snap up the tickets whilst stocks last! Don’t leave it too late…

As a major festival exclusive this summer, the voice of real middle England, The Streets (aka  Mike Skinner) will be headlining both Get Loaded festivals - Cardiff Calling and Get Loaded in the Park and have the honour of closing the main stage in both cities. Having first broke onto the scene in 2002 from the ashes of UK garage with the pioneering album ‘Original Pirate Material’, The Streets followed up their Mercury Prize nominated debut with a No.1 selling second album, ‘A Grand Don’t Come For Free’ in 2004. This highly praised concept album took the South London outfit to a whole new level (3 million copies sold, plus multiple Brit and Ivor Novello awards), before album No.3; last year’s ‘The Hardest Way To Make An Easy Living’ album saw The Streets replace fiction with fact on their honest and frank tale of celebrity darkness… confirming their status as one of the world’s most innovative and original artists. Likewise, the World’s undisputed No.1 DJ (DJ Mag Top 100 Poll 2005/2006), Paul Van Dyk takes over the mantle from Carl Cox as this year’s exclusive South West Four festival headliner in London and Cardiff. Nicknamed ‘God’ by his die-hard legion of fans, PVD has been one of the most consistent DJ/Producers of the past decade, scooping multiple awards and accolades en route to rocking just about every country on the planet. He rarely plays in the UK, making his weekend appearances even more special, plus with a forthcoming artist album on the way and with a brilliant back catalogue that boasts classic tracks like ‘For An Angel’… PVD really is the closest thing to God you’ll see in Clapham and Cardiff all summer!!

METRO WEEKENDER LONDON

South West Four reads like a who’s who of dance music as the ma-hoo-sive main stage will also witness more A-List performances from the planets biggest DJs, namely - Sasha, Roger Sanchez, Pete Tong, Layo & Bushwacka, Plump DJs ands SOS – that’s Demi, Desyn Masiello and Omid16B. Over in the Tents, this year sees a bit of a reshuffle as we welcome John Digweed’s pioneering Bedrock brand to the Common to present a one-off ‘International’ adventure featuring some of the powerhouses of the electronic scene. Step forward Hernan Cattaneo, Eric Prydz, Sander Kleinenberg and Jimmy Van M. Elsewhere, the throbbing Gallery & HeatUK Tent will remain, offering the finest in tech-house and trance. Dutch destroyers Ferry Corsten and Marco V, plus Judge Jules and the hottest new kid on the block – Sander Van Doorn keep the kids happy. The 4th Arena will be announced very soon. Over at Get Loaded in the Park, main stage support for The Streets goes to indie-rockers Dirty Pretty Things. Pete Doherty got loaded last summer and now it’s the turn of his former Libertines bandmate Carl Barât to rock the Common with his new band!! It’s our great pleasure to announce that London’s leading indie/rock station X-FM will be the official hosts of this year’s Get Loaded Bands Tent, with global phenomenon Myspace.com looking after business over at the Dance Arena. The X-FM Stage will be headlined by the Mercury Award Winning rapper, Dizzee Rascal - whose back with album no.3 this year. DJ-wise, Belgian’s Dewaele brothers 2 Many DJs aka Soulwax headline the Dance Tent, backed by the hottest names on the electronic scene, namely Modular’s masterful MSTRKRFT, Ed Banger’s chick with attitude – Uffie (Feat. Feadz), plus ‘the new Daft Punk’ Digitalism, who quite frankly, were so darn incredible last year that we simply had to get them back again this summer!!

METRO WEEKENDER CARDIFF

Over at Cardiff Calling, main stage support goes to hometown legends Super Furry Animals, plus new heroes The Automatic. Both bands will undoubtedly bring the roof down when they swagger on stage – the Super Furries with their leanings towards both psychedelic rock and electronica and The Automatic with their ‘electro-disco-metal-rock’. Both bands have a wealth of music to delve into, most notably SFA’s cult track ‘The Man Don’t Give A Fuck’ and The Automatic’s modern classic ‘Monster’. The Mercury Award Winning rapper, Dizzee Rascal joins the Welsh contingent on the main stage as he showcases new material from his highly anticipated 3rd album ‘Maths and English’. This year’s Cardiff Calling will be more of a straight up ‘live bands’ affair, with a heavier emphasis on new and emerging Welsh bands across the 3 stages – featuring for the first time ever, the ‘Cardiff Calling Unsigned’ Arena. Plus many more acts to be announced across all 3 stages very soon. Meanwhile, South West Four’s Cardiff adventure features more global megastars on the main stage as the greatest house DJ of all-time Roger Sanchez joins Sacha, Pete Tong, Timo Maas and breakbeat dons Plump DJs. Over in the Tents, we’re delighted to announce the introduction of the Drum N Bass Arena for the very first time. With such a huge scene blowing up in South Wales and the surrounding cities, we felt it was our duty to bring some DnB riddums to Coopers Field by rolling out the heavyweights. Step forward LTJ Bukem, Goldie, Andy C, Fabio & Grooverider and High Contrast, with more acts to be announced. Elsewhere, the throbbing Time Flies Tent will remain, this year partnered by Radio 1 Resident Eddie Halliwell and his Fire It Up crew. Scratch-master Halliwell will of course headline the Arena, with a wealth of talent in support including Marco V, Tall Paul and Sander Van Doorn. As ever, South West Four will also be working with all the key clubs and DJs from the Cardiff area to give it that familiar touch, so please welcome party starters Cool House Soundsystem to the main stage and the Bionic Allstars to the trance arena.

Coming soon… Look out for more very special Metro Weekender line-up announcements (both cities) as we reveal all the confirmed acts appearing across all the stages at each festival. More info: www.getloadedinthepark.com / www.southwestfour.com.