The Vines

• Craig Nicholls - vocals, guitar
• Ryan Griffiths - guitar
• Patrick Matthews - bass
• Hamish Rosser - drums
• David Oliffe - drums

Amid a whirlwind of publicity, The Vines emerged from Sydney, Australia to become one of the most successful rock bands of their generation. The group, founded by two former McDonalds employees by the names of Craig Nicholls and Patrick Matthews, were immediately heralded by the British music press on the release of their limited edition 7" single 'Factory'. Despite not fitting the general musical requirements of the Garage Rock movement, The Vines found themselves lumped in with the NME's New Rock Revolution and spent the majority of their early days building up an audience in the UK.

Both follow-up singles cracked the Top 40, the second of which, 'Get Free', topped many critic and reader polls at the end of 2002. Their album, Highly Evolved, a mixture of Beck-style eclecticism and post-Nirvana punk rock crashed into the Top 3 (No. 11 in the United States) and received universal critical acclaim. The Vines spent the rest of the year touring the States and Europe and causing controversy, with Craig Nicholls under constant observation from the press, after one article compared his volatile stage antics to those of the suicidal Kurt Cobain. Tom Edwards