Latitude Festival organisers have just announced that three local bands chosen by BBC Introducing in Suffolk are to open The Lake Stage.

Benjamin Bloom

They will be The Soft, Dingus Khan and Benjamin Bloom. Each band will have the honour of opening The Lake Stage over the three days of Latitude 2012, which takes place at Henham Park, Suffolk from 12th – 15th July.

BBC Radio 1 DJ Huw Stephens curates the stage and it’s the third year he has invited BBC Introducing in Suffolk, presented by Graeme Mac and Richard Haugh, to select three local acts to play. Huw says:

“It’s great to have BBC Introducing in Suffolk helping to curate The Lake Stage again this year. The artists they support and help nurture will get to play to a large audience at one of the finest festivals I’ve ever been to, so it’s a great chance for Suffolk artists to get their music heard.”

Friday will see Bury St. Edmunds trio The Soft take to the stage with their unique brand of electronica and shoegaze. For fans of Animal Collective, Four Tet and The Jesus & Mary Chain, they promise to kick-off the weekend’s proceedings with a great start. Singer, guitarist and programmer Henry Morris has this to say:

Dingus Khan

Latitude is a major festival and this is definitely an amazing opportunity. It’s a huge thing to do. We’ve got new material and have been redeveloping our old material for bigger settings – lots more bass and drums. It’s going to be a huge step from just going to Latitude a couple of years ago to playing it.”

Saturday sees nine-piece indie act Dingus Khan take to the stage. The band released their debut single Knifey Spoony on Club Fandango earlier in the year and recently performed a BBC Radio 6 Music session for Steve Lamacq. With three drummers, three bassists and an electric ukulele thrown in for good measure, you’ve never seen rock ‘n’ roll played this way before! Singer and guitarist Benjamin Brown says:

“I’ve never been to a festival in my life…it’s going to be an eye-opener. I haven’t even got a tent! We might have a ridiculous stage show, maybe dancers, The Supremes on backing vocals, a giant maypole erected in the centre of the stage…”

Rounding off the weekend on Sunday is eccentric Ipswich singer-songwriter and piano maestro Benjamin Bloom. Self-described as ‘Over The Top Pop’, Benjamin and his band are preparing to ease revellers into Sunday’s festivities with epic and bombastic tunes from their recent Weird & Wonderful EP. Talking about the opportunity Benjamin says:

“I’m delighted, overwhelmed. It’s a struggle for us unsigned guys to get out of the toilets, get up a level and get into good venues. You trawl around and wait for somebody to give you an opportunity…We’ll deliver big style. They’re going to get a stupid ridiculous over the top show with anthemic songs.”

The Soft