Quoted as a “textural, tangible, and touching experience” by The Line of Best Fit, queer music and performance artist Freddie Lewis is on the rise. In the summer of 2021, Freddie launched his career with his single Growing Pains which made a significant impact on the UK trans community. He’s also played at festivals such as Glastonbury, The Great Escape, and Iceland Airwaves.
Read MoreSelf-described as dreamy and introspective, when listening to Cuckoo Spit you enter into a daydream-like state. Starting as just Lottie, the band has already attracted venues like the Windmill in Brixton, headlined shows, and supported sold-out bands… Cuckoo Spit are quietly storming into the music scene.
Read MoreSoon to release her second EP, Eliza Oakes is embracing the messy and uncertain nature of personal growth, allowing us in on the process of evolving as a human and as an artist. Her latest single Green Light does exactly this, delving into the unknown, and contemplating the vulnerability, faith, and strength in embracing what we can't control.
Read MoreWhilst there’s easy comparisons to make with Ahmed’s influences - MF Doom, Tyler, the Creator, MIKE - he’s undeniably genuine, both in his music and in person. There’s no bravado or fake sincerity about ‘WHATCHIMACALLIT.’ and whilst we chat, it becomes evident that Ahmend is a pretty multifaceted individual. He’s got a healthy sense of humour and manages to balance music, his pharmacy career, collaborations with other creatives, events…In his own words, he just ‘like[s] just knowing people’.
Read MoreNgaio may be based in Bristol but her music certainly shows she will not be pinned down. Her soulful vocals combined with jazz influences - all underpinned by African beats - create a sound all of its own. But it’s not just her music that’s eclectic, her career itself is eclectic too. Not only a recording artist, she is a spoken word artist, activist, DJ and founder of Booty Bass, a Black-led female/non-binary DJ crew.
Read MoreAs I'm writing these words, we have just released our debut EP. It's called 'Welcome To The Family', and despite the song’s subject matter, this thing we've created is absolutely that – a family.
Read MoreProducer and DJ Michael Diamond blurs the boundaries between electronic and jazz, layering his productions with organic instrumentation that slips in cleanly with the crunching beats and shapeshifting synths. His new album Third Culture, released on June 24, is a seven-track cycle that slides gracefully between minimal, percussive atmospherics and scattered dancefloor rhythms. We caught up with Michael to chat about his new album, the Oxford scene and the many artistic intersections of his practice.
Read MorePoetry intertwined with popular music is something the world needs more of. Luckily, current poet laureate Simon Armitage is doing just that with his leftfield ambient post-rock band LYR. Alongside Armitage, LYR are comprised of singer-songwriter Richard Walters and producer Patrick J Pearson. Following the release of their acclaimed debut album Call in the Crash Team LYR have recently released a new EP, Firm as a Rock We Stand, which is part of a wider multi-disciplinary project including a documentary film inspired by the story of Durham’s Category D villages.
Read MoreTwenty years ago Canadian performance artist and musician Merrill Nisker, better known as Peaches, released her seminal debut album The Teaches of Peaches. As well as paving the way for an explosion of electroclash dance-punk into the musical spotlight the album was a gamechanger in other ways too. In an era when female sexuality was in the main still only put on public display for consumption by male audiences (and even then it was kept neat and sanitised), gender identity was still an underground concept and body shaming was ingrained in popular culture, Peaches unashamedly tackled these issues head-on, both in her music and on stage.
Read MoreWith a big blues voice, a rock star energy on stage and a style that combines country and Irish folk music, Derby-based singer/songwriter Kezia Gill has transcended the narrow confines of musical genres to hone a sound that is truly inimitable.
Read MoreThe jazz/hip hop duo CoN&KwAkE are the latest artists to release on Shabaka Hutching’s label Native Rebel Recordings, but neither are strangers to the London music scene. Con, otherwise known as Confucius MC, has been a major name in UK hip hop since the early noughties, and Kwake Bass is a producer and current or recent Musical Director for big names like Sampha, Kae Tempest and Nightmares on Wax, as well as the drummer of choice for, amongst others, MF DOOM and Lianne La Havas.
Read MoreI Used To Be Sam is the latest step in an ongoing creative journey. Songwriter and vocalist Annie Goodchild took the brave step of exploring tough questions of identity, family and belonging through their music under their most recent artist moniker, I Used To Be Sam. We had the great pleasure of chatting with I Used To Be Sam from their home in Basel, northern Switzerland, taking in everything from family connections to graphic novels and artist friends.
Read MoreIf you’re a fan of post-punk and / or Bristol music you really need to get to know the music of Maximum Joy, if you haven’t already. Sounding as fresh as they did when they formed, mixing punk, dub, funk, free jazz, Afrobeat and hip-hop with wild improvisation, seminal post-punk band Maximum Joy rose up from the fertile Bristol music scene of the late 70’s and early 80’s.
Read MoreLu.Re is a London-based producer, DJ and vocalist who began producing during lockdown and has already established a fanbase and a great deal of support from others in the field, including Radio 1extra’s DJ Target. Her debut EP, Ruminate, is set to drop on May 26. A classically trained viola player, Lu.Re interweaves spiralling breakbeats and thick, bendy basslines with viola and vocals, and she mixed and produced the entire EP in her London flat.
Read MoreGlasgow alt-rockers The Wife Guys of Reddit are on the up and up, fuelled by musical experimentation and a keen sense of the absurd. Originally formed as a duo by Arion Xenos and Niamh MacPhail, The Wife Guys have since been joined by Angus Fernie on keyboards and synths and Elise Atkinson on drums. Their latest single, Pig Fat, is raucous and thoroughly enjoyable, all murky bass and scratchy riffs, with a nicely surreal, rough-edged DIY video to match.
Read MoreMeet Hembree - the sunniest, dreamiest sound to come from over The Atlantic in quite some time. The Kansas City-based indie rockers’ second album was released in February and finds the quintet pushing their established sound—first glimpsed on 2019’s debut House on Fire—to new, colourful zeniths.
Read MoreLondon’s Nic Nell, better known as Casually Here, has been carving out experimental electronic soundscapes for over a decade. Described as a ‘multidisciplinary artist, composer, sound designer and record producer with a background in art and mathematics’, Casually Here has just released his second solo album, Possible Worlds, on his own Algebra label.
Read MoreMeet REX, a queer Bristol-based DJ taking the local underground dance scene and making it theirs. After completing Saffron’s Mix Nights course in late 2019, REX has not held back in quickly becoming one of Bristol's most exciting DJs, blending everything from Grime and Dubstep to UK Funky and breaks.
Read MoreIt’s no secret that Bristol has a buzzing arts and culture scene, whether you’re into all-night raves, contemporary art, ballet or mosh pits. So it’s fantastic news that the Gig Buddies scheme has come to Bristol via the Exchange. Gig Buddies is a program for adults with autism, learning disabilities or neurodivergences of any kind. The scheme matches volunteers and participants in a “buddy” scheme, allowing them to get out and enjoy gigs and live music at venues across the city, with the security of their buddy by their side.
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