?After reports emerged that new Cardiff City Football Club owners are considering dropping the clubs historic blue colours for ‘more commercial’ red. Kelly – a Leeds United, has thrown his opinion into the circle on the bands Facebook page earlier today.

“Is nothing sacred? Speaking as a non Cardiff City fan, but as a full blooded Welshman, I have to say I am bemused by the news I am hearing about turning Cardiff City Bluebirds into the Cardiff City Red Dragons! Changing the famous blue strip to red! Is this Malaysian gentlemen unaware we have a national team with such a strip. What’s next an Australian buying Manchester United and dressing them in stars and union jacks and calling them the red kangaroos? What happened to this great game? Pull the reins in Santa for fuck sake!!!”

Stereophonics are pleased to announce that they will be performing at the Olympic Games opening ceremony celebration concert in London’s Hyde Park on Friday 27th July, along with Snow Patrol, Duran Duran and Paolo Nutini.

The London 2012 opening ceremony will be broadcast live on giant screens so it’s sure to be a great day!

Tickets go on sale at www.btlondonlive.com on Friday 4th May at 09:00am.

Hope to see you there!

They remain one of the biggest Welsh bands of their generation and will, incredibly, this year mark 20 years since founder members Kelly and Richard Jones first performed together. As Stereophonics prepare to release an ambitious concept album later this year, Simon Gaskell caught up with the down-to-earth Valleys musicians

Sat in the chairs of a swanky, newly-launched restaurant as a favour to a friend, Kelly and Richard Jones are candid, jovial and seemingly completely at ease.

The pair, half of one of Wales’ most successful ever bands, still talk fondly of friends from Aberdare who teach Art in schools or now work in the media.

And they themselves returned to the place their own astonishing journey to the top of the music industry began this week – a place they still call home.

It is 20 years since Kelly and Richard began writing and performing in the working men’s clubs they grew up near in Cwmaman, the birthplace of Stereophonics.

Fifteen months ago they set to work after leasing a house in London as a creative base and donning overalls to fix it up.

Hours of writing, recording, and script writing in the intervening months has left them with an eighth studio release – a concept album so vast their biggest worry is how to unleash it this October.

Bassist Richard, 37, said: “We’ve got a good bunch of songs together and we are at the stage now of trying to figure out the best way to release them with some film work as well.”

Kelly, lead singer and guitarist, and also 37, added: “For this album we bought our own place in London so we’ve been loving having our own place to work everyday,”

“It’s strange because you are paying your own rent sort of thing you don’t feel the pressure of a clock ticking so you’re more free working.

“If anything we have ended up with double what we’ve had before really and it’s just a relaxing experience.

“The complication at the minute is a way of releasing all this music in bite-size chunks so people understand it, appreciate it, so it’s not too far apart and not too close together.”

The boys, along with band-mates drummer Javier Weyler and guitarist Adam Zindani, have written two albums – split into three volumes – and the music will revolve around a screenplay they have penned themselves.

The film will accompany the album’s release, in a not dissimilar fashion to The Who’s 1979 Mod opera Quadrophenia.

Kelly has been working with a screenwriter from Bafta in London who, he said, has “kicked the s*** out of” him.

But having always entertained a more cinematic vision for their work, Kelly admits he has relished throwing himself into it and it has “opened his head”.

He said: “We have been trying to make the music around a screenplay we are writing as well and it completely opens your head to new ways of writing and new ways of playing.

“It has been very expressive and quite unpredictable.

“Making an album is quite different every time because you usually come off the back of a different experience whether you have been travelling or whatever else.

“Obviously you are a different age every time you make a record so your frame of mind is different as well and you normally use a different studio.

“We always try to change it up in our camp.”

And Kelly says that with no obligations to TV and radio and taking a break from touring for the first time in 14 years, it has meant they have enjoyed being a “real band” again.

He said: “We had such a good time making it and the first music will probably be out in October backed up by a visual short film clips.

“We are really chuffed with it. It is some of the best stuff we have done and it has been one of those experiences where it has felt like a real band.”

Richard said: “At the end of the day, when the band was formed a long time ago – but not that long ago – we had all got the same goals which was set in stone and what we are doing now is something that everybody is on board with.”

Kelly says one of their express aims in making the record was to offer an alternative to the banal popular music culture which has developed over the last couple of years.

“For us it’s just about trying to do something different on this record that isn’t pop culture,” he said.

“Pop culture is very female pop-orientated or TV pop-orientated. It’s not something I want to compete against. If anything you want to go completely the opposite way and trying to use the stuff you learned along the way.”

Richard and Kelly were talking at the launch of the Amici restaurant in Cardiff, after spending a portion of the week back in Cwmaman.

They were joined at the opening by Caerphilly’s WBO light heavyweight world boxing champion Nathan Cleverly whose passion for pugilism Kelly shared in his younger years.

“I used to box in the ring and Richard used to box in the nightclubs,” Kelly says with a grin.

The trio are friends with the restaurant owner Toni Venditto whose eateries Kelly and Richard used to frequent when they were trying to crack the Cardiff music scene as teenagers.

But whether it is boxing champions, friendship with The Rolling Stones or the admiration of famous fans like Manchester United striker Wayne Rooney, they remain grounded.

Recently they broke their live-gig hiatus at the Royal Albert Hall – at a charity event for the Teenage Cancer Trust with their good friend Ronnie Wood.

And even after two decades of mixing it with some of the best in the business, Kelly says the novelty has never worn off.

“It doesn’t get normal,” he said.

“The people you meet are usually 99% really lovely people.

“It’s nice to introduce your family to people from The Who and The Rolling Stones and the charity event was such an amazing thing to do because we have all always been about music.”

And for Kelly, who used to sell fruit and veg on Aberdare market as a boy, they have they ever got complacent about who they are.

“Everybody gets married, has houses, loses houses, has wives, and lose them,” he said.

“It’s part of life whether you are in a band or not.”

I know things are quiet, but when the band do nothing we have nothing to report but you can be sure once there is news will we remain the most frequently updated Stereophonics on the internet! Got some good news for long time readers of the site also – this Wednesday we will see the return of the Stereophonics Bootleg Vault!

But, I’ve not done this for the past 2 years but it worked well in the earlier years of the site and would like to ask your favour once again, the site is up for renewal at the end of the month and if you can spare anything we would greatly appreciate it. All donators will receive a special code to access a hidden section of the site featuring some rare Stereophonics videos & downloads!

So if you can help please click the button below! Thank you!

“He was a very nice man. Good-looking fella. I was consumed the whole day when I heard the news. I couldn’t get my head around it.”

Kelly broke off from working on new material with the band in Brussels in November to record his acoustic version of Andy Williams “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” in tribute to Speed for BBC Wales.

The song became an adopted anthem of Welsh football fans during Speed’s playing career with Wales after being used in a BBC Wales promo for the 1994 World Cup qualifying campaign.

Speed, who was found dead at his Cheshire home aged 42 on 27 November 2011, was an integral part of the Wales squad that came so close to qualifying for the World Cup finals in the United States. One of the clubs he played for during his career was Leeds United – Kelly’s favorite club.

Wales will play a memorial match for Speed against Costa Rica, the team who he made his Wales debut against in May 1990, in Cardiff on Wednesday.

Original article can be found here.

Granted, the unconfirmed ‘upcoming concert’ could be anytime, but with it being an active prize for this Summer’s tournaments, you have to believe the concert is sooner rather than later.

Kinetic 5s is a series of unique corporate football tournaments in the UK, 100% of profits raised through companies participants in the Kinetic 5s is re-invested into the Homeless World Cup.

From the Kinetic 5s website…

World famous band The Stereophonics are showing their support for the Homless World Cup by offering 8 spots for you to meet them at one of their up and coming concert’s sound checks as well as tickets to the main event.

Read more about Kinetic 5s and how to get involved here.

Weller, Daltrey and Jones will kick off the run of shows on March 28, with McCartney appearing on March 29 and Example following on March 30.

Kelly most recently performed at the run of shows, when Stereophonics performed there in 2009.

See Teenagecancertrust.org for more information about the shows.

The line up for the Teenage Cancer Trust gigs is as follows:
Paul Weller, Roger Daltrey and Kelly Jones (March 28)
Paul McCartney (March 29)
Example (March 30)
Pulp (March 31)
Jessie J (April 1)
Comedy evening with Jason Manford and special guests (April 2)
Florence And The Machine (April 3)

Tickets go onsale on Friday (February 24) at 9.30am. To check the availability of Teenage Cancer Trust Gig tickets and get all the latest listings, go to ticketmaster.co.uk

This April, Richard will join others in trying to raise money in this years Thames Hospicecare Bike Ride.

Richard will cycle for 25 miles in a route that both begins and ends at Higginson Park, in Marlow on April 22 and the THc hope to raise more money than last years impressive £32,000.

Entry is £10 per person and cyclists must be aged over 16. To sign up, visit http://www.thameshospicecare.org.uk or for more information, call Michelle on 01753 848963.

Original article here.

As we gear up for the BRIT awards tomorrow night, speculation is running high as to which two artists will take to the stage for a memorable performance together.

At the awards in 2000, Stereophonics were joined by Tom Jones to perform their single ‘Mama Told Me Not To Come’ and a recent survey shows it’s the nations favourite duet in the history of the BRITs beating Jay Z & Alicia Keys in 2010 and also Rihanna with the Klaxons in 2008.

Read more here.

In an interview with the Daily Post, Cardle talked about coming to Wales as he prepares to embark on his first solo tour following the release of his second album, he had the following to say:

“There are some fantastic artists that have come from Wales too. I absolutely love the Stereophonics, I think they’re amazing – if Kelly Jones fancies it I’d love to duet with him at some point.”

Full article can be found here.