No. Here's the story in full...
- A Scottish tabloid picked up on some comments Tom made:
"A BATTLE of the bands is raging today, after the singer of super group Keane described top of-the-bill The Darkness as a 'joke'.
Tom Chaplin insisted that people who go to see Justin Hawkins' sensational band will be 'embarrassed' to admit that they were fans in a few years.
Speaking exclusively to The Razz, Tom said: 'I'll be trying to catch lots of bands at T in the Park but not The Darkness. I don't want to be too controversial. I'm not a Darkness fan. I just think that in a few years people will look back and say: 'God, do you remember whenwe loved The Darkness?' and find it embarrassing.
'I'd rather watch Spinal Tap,' he said. 'It's funnier. It's a shame The Darkness take themselves so seriously. Unfortunately, they are just a novelty act. I hear they are impressive live, but they are not a band who speak to me. I wonder what they can do next. I would love to see them make a complete departure musically because they are not breaking any barriers. You just can't imagine their sound going somewhere.
He added: 'Being a real music fan, there are so many great bands. It was interesting at Glastonbury watching an awe-inspiring guy like Paul McCartney playing. His singing was brilliant. He was fantastic. I can't imagine me feeling that way if I go to see The Darkness.'
'I'm a bit tired of being diplomatic and guarded about stuff. Everyone, including us, is entitled to an opinion. It's not a personal slur on Justin Hawkins, but it is just not music that speaks to me in any sort of way. As far as the outfits are concerned, what you make of them is a matter of opinion. You won't see us in Spandex.'"
Source - Frankie Poullain (now ex-bassist from the Darkness) commented:
"What are those public schoolboys like? We used to call namby-pambys like that bedwetters - but now they've taken it to a whole new league.
Keane are now more sheet-soilers than bedwetters and play music to suck your thumb to. I did try to have a word with their lead singer about all this but I just couldn't get his dummy off him - he has a very strong grip you know."
Source - Obviously, the media were eager to hype up this 'war of words', even resulting in a Beano style comic of the "Keane vs The Darkness" in the NME: Part1, Part2.
- However, Tim came on the messageboard, and posted this message:
"i'm afraid this is just a tabloid trying to get a bit of scandal going, and talk of any rivalry between us and the darkness is just utter bollocks so i suggest you guys ignore it. they're one of the most entertaining bands to emerge for years, and their current popularity is a testament to that. and anything that gets people out to see gigs is good news. we also have a lot of respect and sympathy for the band because, like us, they had to spend years and years working and waiting before anyone paid them any attention. however i think it's pretty apparent that we're into completely different styles of music from them (apart from, is suspect, a shared love of early queen!), and so it's hardly suprising that tom should say that those songs don't move him as much as some other music does. anyone who says they adore every single band out there is blatantly lying. and as for the future, it goes without saying that any band has to develop and change if they're going to stay relevant and keep suprising people....and at the moment the darkness' appeal is so rooted in a particular style that it's hard to guess where they'll go next. but it was hard to guess how u2 would develop after the joshua tree, and they came back with achtung baby. and personally i hope for the sake of the music scene as a whole that the darkness do stick around, because we need bands like that just as much we need keane or dr dre or norah jones or slipknot or aphex twin. it's a shame some people struggle to appreciate the grey areas between loving a band and hating them, but i guess that sort of possessiveness and agression has long been a part of music fandom. frankly i think there's enough aggression in the world just now without bands (and their fans) turning on each other. and, as we've said in many interviews, we're very proud of the fact that keane fans don't subscribe to that attitude. anyway that's what i think, and as far as we as a band are concerned that's the end of it. love from tim"
SourceThis comment was later picked up by the NME (claimed to be an 'exclusive', even though it was word-for-word the same as the above).
- The following then appeared from Justin (lead singer of the Darkness) in a post-Reading interview with the NME:
"Keane apologised for insulting The Darkness recently. Do you accept their apology?
Source
Justin: "They didn't insult us anyway. We just didn't like their music and that's fine. [I presume they meant "They just didn't like our music and that's fine" - Chris] I actually quite enjoyed the singles that we heard to be honest. I heard a few songs on the radio and it is very difficult to make a judgement on a band based on their singles. But they [are] alright. Poppy Radiohead." - It all came to a happy ending at the BandAid20 recording in mid November - see this picture! (Taken from Q Magazine)
Do Keane hate the Libertines?
No.
- The following story was published:
KEANE star TIM RICE-OXLEY has accused THE LIBERTINES of lying about their "rough background" to improve their rock and roll image.
The BEDSHAPED pianist and his bandmate TOM CHAPLIN went drinking with Libertines stars CARL BARAT and GARY POWELL and were shocked by their polite and sophisticated demeanour.
And Rice-Oxley is still furious about the troubled band's dishonesty, and insists fans respect Keane because unlike The Libertines, they are honest enough to admit they're from a white, middle-class background.
He fumes, " I think we show more guts and honesty by being ourselves. One in ten bands you meet are probably middle class kids who got into music for the same reasons we did. Some people lie and say they grew up on a rough estate when they didn't.
"And the white, middle-class media buys it. A band like The Libertines are no rougher in terms of background than we are.
"Me and Tom went out in Japan with Carl and Gary from The Libertines. People who read the music press wouldn't believe that could be true. But it is. They're very nice people who weren't smoking crack."
Source - Speaking on the messageboard, Tim commented:
"i would like to point out that this is indeed a badly written tabloid story, featuring a variety of inaccurate, out-of-context, misattributed and fictitious quotes. i've never met any of the libertines and i would never call them 'middle-class liars'. please ignore this bullshit story and tell any libertines fans you know to do the same! merry christmas all. tim"
Source
Do the band have a stylist / are they manufactured?
No. Check out the following messageboard post from Tim, in response to an article in the Guardian (Friday 8th July 2005) claiming the band were styled.
Dear everyone,
We're pretty angry about the article in The Guardian today by Alexis Petridis in which he bizarrely chooses to use Keane as an illustration of how all bands today are manufactured.
Even though most people in the media have been extremely kind to us in the last couple of years, we've nonetheless become used to the odd poor review and snide comment. Generally our approach is to try to ignore all media coverage of the band, good and bad, and get on with playing gigs and writing songs. However, when someone chooses to present as the truth a series of lies and wild inaccuracies about the way we are as people and as a band, we feel unable to just sit here and shrug our shoulders.
Mr Petridis' account of how our band has been shaped and polished by image consultants, media trainers and stylists is so stupidly inaccurate as to actually be vaguely amusing. It's hard to tell whether his story is founded on some inexplicable malice or merely incompetent research, but he has certainly been very creative. The suggestion that Moving Brands had anything to do with creating an image or ethos for the band is offensive and ridiculous. The idea that we might have been sat down to conduct mock interviews is bordering on hilarious. Our one tentative brush with someone who brought us free clothes to wear felt so awkward and uncomfortable that we vowed never to do it again. Finally, Alex lake is not an employee of Moving Brands, nor is he any kind of image consultant; he is a trusted friend, sometime roadie and independent photographer who has taken many excellent shots of the band and with us has designed most of our record sleeves.
The journalist's conclusion that many so-called indie bands are in fact manufactured products may well be correct for all I know. However, Keane is not one of those bands. I doubt there are many bands out there who have less to do with the strange world of manufactured pop than us. I doubt there is any band out there that has more complete artistic control and independence in everything it does. I don't know of any band out there that has waited and worked for longer to have its moment in the spotlight. And I don't understand how a supposedly music-loving journalist can whinge about the lack of integrity in British music and at the same time bemoan the success of a band of childhood friends that writes intensely personal songs, controls all its artistic output, and rejects styling or branding of any kind. Our image, if we have one, has been shaped only by me, Tom and Richard and the songs we write.
Source
