“We are unbelievably excited to reveal that the 1st band announcement this year is the one & only Jamie Lenman who will be tearing up The Cave on Saturday night at 2000 Trees Festival! We are massive, massive fans, and we know you guys are too.”
I’ll assume you know this chap from fronting Reuben until their untimely demise in 2008. What you may not know is the tragic relationship the band had with 2000 Trees…
I was going to sum up what this following article says but it really is a heartwarming read that really gets down to what a musical should be and what 2000 trees always is-
“In 2008, Reuben were booked to headline the second ever 2000trees festival, but for a number of reasons too lengthy to go into here, they broke up just weeks before it was due to happen. This tragic loss to the UK music scene left myself, my good friend Steph Eastty and a whole horde of other Reuben fan(atic)s with tickets to a festival we knew nothing about, purchased solely to see a band who now wouldn’t be there, and initially no one could muster much enthusiasm for attending the festival without Reuben. After some discussion however, we decided that what the hell – we’d go along anyway, on the off chance that there were some other bands worth seeing, or some hijinks to be had. We formed a plan to camp together under the (admittedly unoriginal) moniker “Camp Reuben” and together we would drink, laugh, and sing Reuben songs all night, to celebrate the band we loved rather than mourning their demise. I’d bring my guitar, Steph would make a flag – it was a fine plan, and one that came to fruition in an unexpectedly spectacular style: after the last band finished their set on the Friday night of the festival, Camp Reuben found itself playing host to a sing-along on an epic scale, as Reuben fans from all over the festival came to join the party. Amongst these was Frank Turner, who eventually ended up with the guitar, playing pretty much whichever songs we shouted at him for the best part of 2 hours. It was awesome. When we ended the night we had well over 100 people crammed into our small campsite, all of them singing their hearts out.
Since then 2000 Trees has become a regular fixture in our calendars – we’ve been back every year, bringing the same Camp Reuben flag and the same beaten up old acoustic guitar. We’ve repeated the sing-along too, though never on quite the same scale as that first year. It’s an incredible festival, so it’s nice to remember how we discovered it in the first place and it’s always a great moment when someone stumbles upon our campsite, spots the flag and says “So THIS is Camp Reuben!” – it’s quite cool feeling like part of the furniture, however small.“
That is still slightly abridged, I will cover the beast that camp rueben has morphed into when we know exactly what’s going to be going down there this year.
For the time being though, for your listening pleasure- Jamie Lenman
Video Blog #4