It was interesting watching the twitter, blogs, news etc on this years first ibiza rocks 2009 band announcements. last year there was a lot of coverage but this year has been far greater on the net.

Even though we say so ourself we thought our ibiza rocks 2009 news blog had the best layout

Andy led with their twitter feed an hour before the official embargo time (we think - we could be wrong but since he *is* ibiza rocks we think thats fair - and also for server timings reasons below we could be wrong but the ibizarocksnews twitter was easily way ahead of everyone else), The Sun newspaper we think went 15 mins early on their website post and our automated blog post posted at 2am on the dot (1am uk) but our facebook and twitter feeds took sometime to filter through for some reason (if we had bothered to stay up we wouldve made sure on twitter etc and hit the bands message boards at exactly 2am (embargo time). All of last years Ibiza Rocks gigs we posted photos on our blog and the relevants bands message boards by 3am the same night).

Technorati (not google) were the first to break the news on the net - ours and The Sun’s - because of server times and looking back its difficult to retrospectively confirm the actual times - but it was around 8 hours before google - give or take an hour)

From about 7am onwards the rss feeds starting coming from other websites but as the spotlight said - the first “google” *alert* was radio 1 at 10ish - before 10am though anyone with an rss reader or knew how to search on twitter would’ve have known about it hours before radio1 went with it and google picked it up.

By lunchtime every other twitter post on ibiza search was announcing ibiza rocks lineups and then after lunch the u.s. sites started in - by 3pm ish we’d gven up thinking about how many tweets had been posted.

We’re looking foward to all of the bands as ppl like vampire weekend and mgmt we’d like to see live and pendulum last year were brilliant - klaxons as the closing party should be a lot of fun and the enemy are always great live.

There is still a bunch of bands to be announced and we’re really hoping one of them is a band we saw back in February.

Ibiza is set for another rocking year - we can now announce the first set of bands for Ibiza Rocks 2009.

Ibiza stalwarts The Enemy are back again - you can’t keep this lot away - this will be the forth time they’ve played Ibiza Rocks - we think they like it! Pendulum are back again after last years storming closing party and Dizzee Rascal will be back.

New Yorkers Vampire Weekend and MGMT will be playing for the first time and The Kooks return after last playing in 2005 when they were unsigned and relatively unknown.

Tickets will be available to buy from 9am Monday 30 March at seetickets, priced £28.50 - £37.50 plus booking fee.

Ibiza Rocks Hotel prices from £19 per person per night based on 3 sharing a Standard Studio including a gig ticket for the Opening Party on 16 June.

Andy McKay, Promoter, Ibiza Rocks said: “Ibiza Rocks has pioneered a social rejuvenation of the island. The land of dad house where money talked is being replaced. Youth is the islands vibrant new currency. Move over old timers and long live Ibiza Rocks.”

16 June	Opening Party with very special guests
23 June	TBC
30 June	The Kooks
07 July	TBC
14 July	TBC
21 July	TBC
28 July	Pendulum
04 Aug	The Enemy
11 Aug	Dizzee Rascal
18 Aug	Vampire Weekend
>25 Aug	MGMT
01 Sept	TBC
08 Sept	Closing Party with Klaxons and special guests

To save having to visit all the seperate ibiza twitter feeds we’ve put them all together on one page - the first page is all the main ibiza clubs plus ibiza rocks - there is another page with various ibiza twitter feeds eg Bora Bora, DC10, Ibiza Sonica radio and Judge Jules.

If you’d like to see others then just drop us a line or follow us on our own IbizaBlog twitter feed

The first set of Ibiza Rocks bands will be announced first thing Monday morning.

Subscribe to the rss feed or the twitter feed so you get the details as soon as you log on to the net

It’s going to be another good summer for live music…

Some excerpts from the beginning of Ibiza NOW’s history:

Hello and welcome to the history page. This month we are going to interrupt our current series in order to report on one of the milestones of contemporary island history. This long overdue feature takes us back to the living roots of today’s English-speaking community and explores the foremost organ of expression within that community. We are referring, of course, to the founding of the Ibiza NOW in 1984. The magazine’s 25th anniversary provides us with the perfect opportunity to headline the full, unabridged story of how Sally Wilson engendered the longest enduring foreign-language periodical on the island today.

Our narrative starts in the early summer of 1965. Sally was about to return to her native California after a year working with a British government organisation promoting international trade when her London friends proposed a Mediterranean holiday. Although she had travelled around Europe in previous summers, Sally recalls looking at the photo of their holiday destination with the word IBIZA written below and thinking “I have no idea where that is.” Little did she suspect that four years later she would be establishing the first ever foreign language news publication on the island, the now legendary Ibiza Insight.

By September 1968 it was clear that the Ibiza Insight was on its way to becoming an integral part of the islands’ international community. The historic boom years of Ibiza’s tourist industry were rapidly approaching, witnessed by the new hotels that were being projected by local entrepreneurs. The Ibiza Insight finished its first season with a promising future ahead, ready to expand in volume and desirous of improving its graphic and photographic content.

The two intrepid editors set off for Palma de Mallorca to find a new printer, eventually arriving at the Spanish newspaper, Ultima Hora, where they found a friendly welcome and advanced printing technology. Beginning with the first 1969 edition, the Ibiza Insight was printed in Palma, soon doubling in size and adding the distinctive trademark bright orange to many of its pages.

Errol Flynn (3rd left) with entourage on one of his frequent visits to Ibiza

Click on image for a larger version

As soon as the newspaper was firmly established, the editors began to reach out to the community with various activities never before attempted on the island. At the end of the 1969 summer season the first ‘Miss Ibiza Insight Gala’ took place at the then recently inaugurated Sa Tanca night club. The 20-some contestants of various nationalities, included local residents and others who were here for the summer, all of whom had previously appeared as the ‘Ibiza Insight Girl of the Week’ with a photograph and an interview in one of that summer’s editions. The presence of a celebrity panel of judges, which over the years included many film stars and international celebrities, added to the glamour of the event, with island residents always filling the outdoor venue to capacity.

These are just excerpts - you can read the entire article on the main ibiza now website here

We’ve added the Ibiza Rocks twitter feed to our Ibiza Rocks 2009 News & Lineups page.

Here’s how it looks:

Our CD reviewer on Ibiza NOW Magazine for the past 6 years has been Steve Norman of Spandau Ballet fame. In a coincidence, Spandau Ballet will be announcing the reforming of the band at a press conference today on HMS Belfast - the site of their original launch party - at the same time we have been going back through the archives because of Ibiza NOW Magazine’s 25th anniversary and we came across an interview with Steve Norman first published in 1985 by our predecessor, the Ibiza Forecast.

Spandau Ballet at Dalt Vila in Ibiza Town

“Halfway through the show the audience and the group are getting together. By the end of the show we are one. That feeling is like a drug to me. ..l want to be doing this for the rest of my life.”

The evening concert in the Universal Amphitheater in Los Angeles, California was progressing smoothly and as planned, time now for Steve Norman, saxaphonist for the popular group “Spandau Ballet“, to slide across the stage on his knees, like every other night. But this time something snapped and Steve wound up with a very sore knee requiring some delicate surgery. The doctor issued a distressing verdict: three months without any strenuous activity for Steve. A temporary death sentence for a band which is known for its lively stage shows.

The original article - click on the image for a larger verion

“We were really looking forward to our tour of Spain”, Steve Norman said, Ieaning on his cane and enjoying the party at KU. “Spanish audiences are great. We played for the first time in Spain four years ago right here in KU. But now we couldn’t as our equipment is now so large that it wouldn’t fit in here.” Although Steve is under doctor’s Orders not to do any live performances that doesn’t mean that the group has been idle. “We’ve been busy getting new material together and recording, We are always busy”, said Steve Norman. Does that mean a new LP soon? “Yes”, revealed Steve. without saying when. Spandau Ballet prefers giving live shows to working in the Studio. “I like touring because it puts us face to face with the people who buy our records”, said Norman.