Kasabian tell us why they covered Nirvana at Reading & Leeds 2017

'It was huge. It was like a dream'

Kasabian have spoken to NME about the ‘dream’ of headlining Reading & Leeds 2017 for a second time – and explained why they chose to cover Nirvana during their set. Watch our video interview with guitarist Serge Pizzorno above.

NME spoke to Pizzorno before they hit the main stage at Leeds Festival, where he explained that their second time headlining was ‘way more relaxed’ – but they were inspired to cover ‘All Apologies’ by Nirvana‘s ability to ‘just take you head off off’.

“It was everything and more of what you expect,” guitarist Serge Pizzorno told NME. “It was a massive crowd. You can always tell by the burger vans – if it stretches out to there then it’s like ‘shit, that was big’. It was huge. The encore was like a dream, it was insane. Time just stood still and I was gone.”

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“The set was just like nuclear warfare which was great. If you’ve been there all day, then it’s not the time to drop a nice little acoustic number in there. It was like ‘let’s just go full throttle’ – and it worked. We did a nice little shout out to Nirvana because it was 25 years since they played, so we did ‘All Apologies’. I felt it on stage. It was a beautiful moment.”

Pizzorno added: “As a kid, it passed me by. There was a divide with Nirvana. Nirvana kids and rave kids – they just didn’t mix. It’s only in the last 10 years or so that I really got into Nirvana. He was one of the greats – the true greats. We’ve always put a song before ‘LSF’; we did ‘Praise You’ [by Fatboy Slim] for a bit, which we might bring back, and we did ‘You Got The Love’ [by Candi Staton] as well – so it was nice to do something before.”

Kasabian at Leeds Festival 2017
Kasabian at Leeds Festival 2017

Leeds Festival concludes tomorrow with sets from Eminem, Major Lazer and KoRn, while Reading closes with Muse, Liam Gallagher, Blossoms and many more. Check back at NME for the latest news, interviews and more from Reading & Leeds 2017.

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