An exhibition showcasing what happens when you combine iconic musical acts and football team crests will be on display in Salford on Sunday November 25.
Bands FC (@_bands_fc) is a Twitter page that showcases artwork that combines famous bands and football teams to create artwork with a difference.
The exhibition has been located at The National Football Museum since early September, but for one day only it will be on display at Salford Lads’ Club.
Featuring iconic Manchester bands, like Oasis and The Stone Roses, as Manchester City and United respectively, most combinations of band and badge have some sort of connection.
Bands F.C.
The Stone Roses pic.twitter.com/ivdxvIr3v6— Bands FC (@_Bands_FC) July 4, 2018
For example, Salford born Charlatans singer Tim Burgess, who helped create Bands FC, has his face featured in the outline of the Salford City crest, in reference to where he was born.
Band FC’s popularity has skyrocketed since its inception in July 2018, gaining 44 thousand twitter followers in that time.
One of the men who created Bands FC, Nick Fraser said: “It just started in July with me, Tim Burgess and Mark Liptrott talking about the world cup, and we ended up talking about how football clubs could be more ‘musical’.
And we thought, wow, there are some brilliant graphic designs for football club badges. We went from there and we had 15 crests in a few days.” Nick, Tim and Mark, not knowing what to do next, sent their designs to NME and received a surprising response.
“They (NME) said wow, can we show these?” From there Bands FC started gaining popularity, and soon featured in The Guardian and CNN, against all of Nick’s expectations, “When we started I though this will be a fun week, I never thought it would take off like this.”
One of the reasons why Bands FC has taken off so rapidly is because of the “just say yes” attitude of Nick Fraser. “We have said yes to everything, we’ve sponsored junior football team strips and raised over 45 thousand pounds for charity.”
Bands FC has even designed a matchday programme for Salford City’s upcoming game against Aldershot.
There is reasoning behind why some clubs end up being combined with certain bands, sometimes they are obvious, like Oasis’s Manchester City connection, others less so. Fraser said some badges were “crossword clues, some quick crossword clues but others cryptic.”
Many other Manchester bands feature in the exhibition, including Joy Division, Elbow and ,of course, The Smiths. However, The Smiths are one of a few select bands whose crest isn’t based on an actual team. Their crest is based purely on the colours of the iconic Salford Lads’ Club, even incorporating the famous green bars onto the badge.
Bands F.C.
The Smiths pic.twitter.com/eboNWHC2fL— Bands FC (@_Bands_FC) July 2, 2018
Fraser said that they have received “Excellent” reviews from people who have seen the exhibition at The National Football Museum over the last few months. “We have broken visitor number records” he said, “Instead of people going for football, football, football, they’re going for football, music, football, which makes it interesting.”
The exhibition is at Salford Lads’ Club on Sunday November 25 between 10am and 7pm, and entry is free.
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