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Ou Est Le Swimming Pool frontman commits suicide at Pukkelpop
By CMU Editorial | Published on Monday 23 August 2010
Ou Est Le Swimming Pool frontman Charles Haddon committed suicide at the Pukkelpop festival in Belgium last week. He was 22.
The news was confirmed by Eddy Temple-Morris during his Xfm show on Friday night. As rumours of Haddon’s death began to fly on Twitter, Temple-Morris sent a text message to the band’s Joe Hutchinson, hoping to put an end to a hoax, but received the reply: “He killed himself early this evening after playing the best gig of his life to 5000 people”. An official statement published on the band’s MySpace page the following day officially confirmed the news to fans, saying: “We are all so deeply saddened to confirm that our friend Charlie Haddon passed away yesterday, Friday 20 Aug”.
According to reports, after the band’s Friday afternoon performance, Haddon jumped from a satellite communications mast in the artists’ parking area of the festival.
A statement on the Pukkelpop website reads: “After performing with his band Ou Est Le Swimming Pool, singer Charles Haddon decided to take his own life. Our thoughts and sympathies go out to his family and friends”.
Ou Est Le Swimming Pool formed in 2009 in Camden and have released three singles to date, including their popular debut ‘Dance The Way I Feel’. Following a number of festival dates and an Australian tour, the band were due to release their debut album, ‘The Golden Years’, and tour the UK in October. You can read CMU’s Same Six Questions interview with Charles Haddon here.
Former frontman of 80s band The Call, Michael Been, also died at the festival. The father of Black Rebel Motorcycle Club frontman Robert Levon Been and a sound engineer for the band, he died after suffering a heart attack at the festival on Thursday.
The Call formed in 1980 and released eight albums between 1982 and 2000, before going on hiatus. Been also released a solo album in 1994 and appeared in a number of films, including Martin Scorsese’s ‘The Last Temptation Of Christ’.
