Tijdens de opbouw van het parcours van de 24-uurs Solexrace plaankgas dur 2 cafe’s tbv KiKa werd de organisatie opgeschrikt door onverwacht nieuws. De mannen van de Lekke Band hebben aangegeven dat zij door persoonlijke redenen hun optreden dat stond gepland op 23 augustus moeten laten schieten.

Drie weken voor het festival moest de organisatie nog op zoek naar een vervanger. Het leek onmogelijk om op zo’n korte termijn precies in de vakantieperiode nog een band te vinden van hetzelfde kaliber.

Het mag dan ook een wonder worden genoemd dat er een vervanger is gevonden. De engelse band Fragment zal het geslagen gat in de muziekprogrammering vol verve gaan dichtmetselen. Dat is wel aan deze drie topmuzikanten toevertrouwd. 

De afzegging van Lekke Band zorgde voor nog een probleem. Als verrassing van de dag zouden zij ook het duo Pap en Pudding live begeleiden. Nog nooit eerder vertoond. De drie heren van Fragment twijfelde geen fragment, zij zullen zondags direct na de finisch het ludieke duo uit Herpen en Oss gaan begeleiden. De 80 teams zullen dus na 24 slopende uren worden getrakteerd op een waar spektakel.

Opbouwen.
Al duurt het nog tien dagen voordat Jeroen v Inkel, Corne Klijn en de Party Animals op vrijdag 21 augustus het festival openen tijdens de Mega Danceclassics Party, de opbouw al in volle gang. Er is al 150 m3 grond verzet, 200 ton gebroken puin opgereden, geknutseld met 800 meter steigerpijp en 500 meter steigerplank. Ook komt er 2 kilometer hekwerk en zullen de 80 pitboxen dit jaar worden gemaakt van marktkramen. Al met al een mooi karwei. Maar er staat nog veel meer muziek geprogrammeerd tijdens dit weekend.

Nadat zaterdag 22 augustus om vier uur het startschot voor de 24-uursrace is gevallen, maken achtereenvolgens ook de lokale rockcoverband Burn out, Clash of the Coverbands-winnaar Rattlesnake Shake, Mooi Wark en WC Experience hun opwachting op de bühne. Zondagochtend vanaf 11 uur zijn er optredens van de Brabantse feestzanger René Habraken, de Lithse Revuo’s, Fragment, het duo Pap & Pudding en René Schuurmans.

Meer info over de 24 uurs Solexrace en over de voorverkoop van toegangskaarten is te vinden op www.willemlexopdesolex.nl en meer info over KiKa op www.kika.nl

Noot van de redactie: wilt u meer informatie over deze band, kijkt u dan deze bijdrage van TV Gelderland of kijk op hun website! Achtergrondinformatie: …are collectively known as the band Fragment. These three Englishmen have been described as “the most famous unknown band in Holland”, the country where they now live and work. They continue to play 150 concerts a year to packed houses and boast a fanbase of many thousands. You can join the official mailing list on this site - just just go the home page, and fill in the form there.

The band have appeared many times on radio & TV (most recently in the JaCobus show as Cobus's "ver van huis band" on Radio 3fm ), and although unknown outside Holland the band have released numerous singles and CD’s and have twice filled the 10,000-seat AHOY in Rotterdam. They have sold over 20.000 T-shirts and have been voted both Horeca band of the year and winners of the celebrated Rottepop festival. Needless to say, they have frequently been described in the press as “the best live act in Holland”. And if you don't believe that, then best go see for yourself...

Tim Dave & Jono met each other at school in  Essex, England where together with various friends they formed Fragment. After various line-ups the band stabilised into a trio, playing concerts around their local area and in London. Sunday afternoons found them religiously rehearsing at Jono’s house to write “lots of songs that went on for ever and no one ever listened to”. Soon they released their first single “Come dancing/Growing Out” but they wanted more...

And Jono [who was inexplicably studying Dutch at London University] visited Holland where he saw an oppurtunity to really make a living from music.They bought and converted a Bedford Luton van to live in, and set off for Holland and Belgium, where, at first, they spent most of their time on the Lijnbaan in Rotterdam, playing on the streets to passers-by, unable to make a living from the few concerts they had. It was here, however,  that they really learned how to perform and entertain as a live band.

“The Lijnbaan was great fun,” says Tim “..we used to get all sorts of stuff thrown at us - once someone gave us a bottle of champagne, another time a fl.100 note, another time a little kid about 5 years old went up to Dave and just spat water at him, almost drenched him! We used to get really big crowds that the bastard barrel organs would try and steal from us, as would the evangelists. The Amazing Stroopwafels were there too -  they were great - and I remember another guy called Dave who was so inspired by our show, that he decided to dress up in a fly costume in an attempt to attract similar crowds!"

" Gradually more and more hall owners saw us on the Lijnbaan and eventually we had enough concerts to stop playing on the streets. I guess you could say that the demand has never stopped".

The band finally started to make their money from concerts, playing whatever people would listen to, even Dutch songs [sung with a strange accent...]. In the beginning all the profits they made went into financing their own music, and for some time they existed on fl.35 per week each! After saving enough to hire a studio the first Album “Insufferable” was released on their own label - and this was then followed by the mini album “Here…” on Mollywood records. Various singles were released including " Love Lust and Lucidity" which made it to no.51 in the Top 100. Whilst recording the “Here…” album, they met Sander van Herk, the guitarist from Het Goede Doel and better known these days as the producer of " De Kast", " City to City" and much of what is good on the Dutch music scene. It’s an association and friendship that has endured and Sander has produced much of Fragment’s material. Says Jono: “If it sounds rubbish it’s his fault then…...”

Fragment’s live reputation was so good that one day a friend realised they were sometimes playing to six thousand people in a single week. “That’s enough to fill the AHOY” said Hans. And so it was. The band rang up the AHOY, booked it, printed ten thousand tickets, discovered that these were easily forged, bought a special anti-forgery stamp, manually stamped ten thousand tickets to render them unforgeable and sold them from the stage at gigs. The concert was a big success. We hope to make the video available here sometime. There was however a sting in the tale....

About this time the boys were busy recording their album the Dream Orchard. Expectations were high and when they were introduced to an American manager (who shall remain nameless for obvious reasons) things really seemed to be falling into place. Just before playing the AHOY, they signed to the manager, after what proved to be worthless legal advice. This meant delaying the release of the Dream Orchard so they could fly to America and play the Midem festival in Florida.The idea being to generate a world wide deal. Needless to say the whole thing proved a disaster, the manager proved worthless, and the band spent enormous sums of money to break their contract. The Dream Orchard was by now very late coming out, all the momentum from the AHOY concert was lost and when it did get released a year later on BMG records, it sank. The whole experience had been deeply disillusioning.

But....the boys were still playing lots of Dutch gigs and decided to do a second AHOY concert. This time in deference to their live act they recorded a version (arranged by Dave) of “Hey Jude” coupled with “32 jaar” the Doe maar song. The second AHOY concert was also a great success but the single wasn’t.

Since then the band has been quietly doing their own thing, raising families, writing songs, playing concerts and building on their reputation as one of the best live bands in Holland. It’s been some years since the last AHOY concert but the interest in the band has never been higher. They continue to play to packed houses all over Holland, they appear regularly on national radio, and are currently recording a new album, produced by themselves and Nico and Syb [formerly of "De Kast"].