COVID-19 SAFETY INFORMATION

ATG who manage the Waterside Theatre are anxious to make the Waterside as safe as possible for you. It will therefore be a requirement that all ticketholders will need to show proof that they are fully vaccinated on arrival or that they have had a negative lateral flow test within 48 hours of arrival. Lateral flow tests will also be available at the door on the night.

You can see the exact arangements HERE.

FRIARS LEGENDS CAMEL WILL RETURN TO WHERE IT ALL STARTED CELEBRATING THEIR 50^th ANNIVERSARY, at the Waterside Theatre on 7 June 2023

 Tickets go on sale this Friday 3 Dec at 10.00am online from ATGTickets/Aylesbury, Ticketmaster and See Tickets or by telephone on 0844 871 7615.

The venue will be entirely seated.

We’re still reeling from Camel’s last Friars Aylesbury appearance at the Waterside on 10 September 2018 when they played the whole of ‘Moon Madness’. We were hoping they would be good, but no one thought they would be THAT good. It was quite simply one of the finest Friars Aylesbury gigs of all time.

We really value bands who are loyal to Friars and Camel are certainly one of them. For this 50^th Anniversary they are playing just 6 dates. Birmingham, Manchester, Edinburgh, Southampton, London and Aylesbury. After the 2018 gig Andy Latimer particularly asked to come back to Friars.

 For these ’50 Years Strong’ dates Camel will be playing their best material from right across their long and distinguished career, which includes their albums ‘Camel’, ‘Mirage’, ‘The Snow Goose’, ‘Moon Madness’, ‘Rain Dances’, ‘Breathless’, ‘I Can See your House from Here’, ‘Nude’ and ‘Stationary Traveller’.

Back in the day, Camel played Friars no less than six times. They first appeared on May 25 1975, just three months before Friars Phase 2 at the Borough Assembly hall ended. They went down a storm and were immediately booked to play Friars again, which by this time had moved to the Phase 3 Civic Centre. This second gig on Nov 8 1975 was the one that many remember best. It was part of their classic Snow Goose tour which is regarded by many to be Camel’s finest hour. Expect to hear Camel play tracks like ‘Rhayader’ and ‘The Great Marsh’ on this 50^th Anniversary gig.

BIG BIG TRAIN rescheduled to Friday 2 September 2022

 Modern prog heroes Big Big Train were originally scheduled to play Friars Aylesbury on 16 July 2020 which, due to lockdown, was postponed until 18 July 2021. This second date was also not possible due to government regulations on live events. 

Today we are announcing that this long-awaited date will now take place on Friday 2 September 2022.

 Tickets for the new date are on sale now from ATGTickets/Aylesbury, Ticketmaster and See Tickets. If you have tickets for the original date or the first postponed date, please hang on to your tickets….. they will be 100% valid for this new rescheduled date. 

Local prog legends LIFESIGNS will also be appearing with Big Big Train on 2 September 2022 although that is still to be confirmed.

 Big Big Train dropped their stunning new album ‘Common Ground’ on 30 July 2021 which is now available on streaming services, CD & Vinyl. Tracks “The Strangest Times’, ‘All the Love We can Give’, ‘Apollo’ and ‘Common Ground’ just have to be heard. The band released a further new song ‘The Connection Plan’ via streaming services on 24 August 2021 as part of their 'Stay Tuned' series." 

Lifesigns released their excellent third album ‘Altitude’ in March 2021

THE FLAMING LIPS RESCHEDULED FROM 21 JULY 2021 to 30 MAY 2022.

 We were all hoping that The Flaming Lips would be able to play Friars Aylesbury at the Waterside Theatre on 21 July but due to Covid uncertainty, travel and quarantine restrictions and the fact that no band or live event in the UK is able to insure against Covid19, all the Flaming Lips 2021 UK dates have been moved to 2022. 

If you’ve already bought tickets it would help Friars Aylesbury enormously if you would hang on to them. They will be 100% valid for the 30 May 2022 date.

If you cannot attend on 30 May 2022 please contact the ticket agency where you purchased the tickets. (ATG Tickets, Ticketmaster or See Tickets) 

Tickets for the rescheduled date are available now to those who haven’t yet bought tickets.

 As you know the live music industry has been decimated since March 2020 with 99% of all live events being made impossible due to Covid restrictions. Friars Aylesbury is hoping to survive this but we can only do it with your help. This amazing Flaming Lips show will happen, but we’ll all have to wait a while longer. 

The May 30 date will be an important date on the Flaming Lips American Head World tour which will now kick off in the USA this coming Autumn.

We can’t wait for live shows to start again. There’s a light at the end of the tunnel.

 TICKETS on sale now from ATGtickets.com, Seetickets.com and Ticketmaster.co.uk.  

FRIARS AYLESBURY ARCHIVE PROJECT

 The Friars Aylesbury Archive is a not-for-profit project wherein we are trying to create a complete archive of all Friars related memorabilia including Friars news sheets, posters, tickets, video, recordings, press cuttings etc. We are then intending to completely digitise everything so that there is a permanent record of everything that has happened since Friars first started in June 1969. 

In order to finance the project we will be offering for sale items where we have excess copies. Any funds created will be used to add additional security to the archive, digitise the archive and to create a fund to buy any missing items of which there are quite a few, as you will see below. We were recently thrilled to be able to purchase a Friars U2 poster from June 1981 which we’ve been after for many years.

As explained we are very keen to acquire the items we are missing, for the archive. Some people have already kindly donated items to the archive for which we are very grateful, but we are quite prepared to pay for them if necessary.  

These are the missing handouts and posters as of May 2021: 

HANDOUTS 

POSTERS   (20” X 30”) 

If you have any of the above items and would like to donate them or allow us to purchase them from you we would be enormously grateful. Please contact Sue@fmlmusic.com 

Many thanks

FRIARS 50^th ANNIVERSARY PODCASTS

Friars Aylesbury first opened its doors on Monday 2 June 1969. Exactly 50 years later on 2 June 2019, the 6 Friars Founding Fathers reunited in Aylesbury’s Kings Head to talk about the early days of Friars and the first magical years of Friars Aylesbury. 

Those participating are legendary rock journalists Pete Frame and Kris Needs as well as the Friars Founding Fathers Robin Pike, Adrian Roach, Jerry Slater, Terry Harms, John Fowler and David Stopps. Also participating are John Braley who managed the Borough Assembly Hall and the Civic Centre for many years, Stephen Daglish who managed Earth Records and created the Aylesbury Music Town website and Keith Martin who was Friars member No 1. 

http://www.buckstv.co.uk/friars-50th-anniversary-podcast-part-two/ 

http://www.buckstv.co.uk/friars-50th-anniversary-podcast-part-one/

 The photograph below shows those participating in the podcast: 

Left to right: 

Kris Needs, Adrian Roach, Robin Pike, David Stopps, Terry Harms, Jerry Slater and Pete Frame.

Wow, that Steve Hillage and Gong gig was amazing - galleries from that gig and the other Friars gigs this year by clicking the relevant poster.

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HEROES....JUST FOR ONE DAY

The statue was unveiled on Sunday March 25th to a large crowd, a large audience watching live online and covered by local and national media. This was followed by an amazing gig featuring local heroes Marillion, Howard Jones, John Otway and the Dung Beatles.

To see the statue live, there is a dedicated webfeed here

Full gallery here

Neale Wareham's gallery here

Full gallery from Erasure gig here

The Thin White Book now available to purchase

At last it's here!

The Thin White Book - A History of David Bowie and Friars Aylesbury is now available here from the Friars Aylesbury online shop - link above in menu or click this link. goo.gl/D6LbGf