“Astrolabe“, an energised droning mix of cello, violin, flute, drums and a pulsating vocal performance, is, according to the band, about “lovers across the centuries; from the love letters between Heloise and Abelard in medieval France to Bonnie and Clyde’s romantic partnership in crime in 1930s America“, thereby enjoining different eras with a recurring theme, love, and creating a shared thread that runs through human history and experience.

Listen to “Astrolabe” below:

Consisting of Nina Winder-Lind (vocals, cello, guitar), Kate Mager (bass), Violet Farrer (violin, guitar, vocals) and Ella Russell (drums, flute, vocals), The New Eves formed in Brighton in 2021, combining an undeniably remarkable DIY ethic with incredible musical talent. This initially resulted in jam sessions in which the band cultivated their now unmistakable sound, splicing ritualistic, communal folk wailing with a punky, droning effect brought by beautiful string tones of cello and violin and, quite clearly, a strong love and appreciation of The Velvet Underground.

Their single “Original Sin” brings together this rustic folk sound with flashes of punk and a certain 60s pop-rock aura, creating a wonderfully catchy track that continually captivates, fades and springs back into glorious life. Like “Astrolabe” this song too weaves a thread through human history, connecting Eve to every woman that has lived since Eve, suffering under the same shared struggle under the traditional patriarchy and religion, yet ultimately becoming emancipated, free to enjoy life as they see fit.

On the lyrics the band added, “The band is fighting a biblical battle between shame and pleasure, body and mind, good and evil. The lyrics are poetic and unapologetic. ‘Throw away my fading halo and start dancing’ is the type of line that’s calling to be written on the bedroom wall of teenagers up and down the country. This is the song Eve would have written if she had an electric guitar.”

Watch the music video for “Original Sin” below:

Watch The New Eves perform “Vallät” at Brighton Electric Studios below:

You can catch The New Eves at The Great Escape Festival in Brighton (15-18 May), Wide Awake Festival in Brixton (25 May) and Green Man Festival in Bannau Brycheiniog National Park (15-18 August).

Uncover your GM24 line-up!

A mighty welcome to your four headliners – the luminous @bigthiefmusic, Mercury-winning @sampha, the transcendental @Jon_Hopkins_, post-punk heroes @sleafordmods & plenty more besides!

Big love, GM pic.twitter.com/eEVIsofCSS

— Green Man (@GreenManFest) March 1, 2024

Other notable acts performing at Green Man this year include prolific cult-heroes Osees, art-rock collective Black Country, New Road, alternative rock group Bar Italia, Scottish shoegaze heavyweights The Jesus and Mary Chain and singer-songwriter Arlo Parks. Also coming to the Brecon Beacons in August are New York alternative rock outfit Blonde Redhead, experimental rock favourites Fat White Family, Kate Stables’ Indie rock band This Is the Kit, jazz quintet Ezra Collective and exciting folk-punk newcomers The New Eves.

Set to return to Bannau Brycheiniog National Park, Wales, the festival is scheduled to run from 15-18 August 2024, and will, for these four days, be home to not only a fantastic variety of live music but also an array of other entertainment, including literature, film, science, theatre and comedy. The grounds are divided into ten areas to accommodate this, ensuring that festival-goers will never experience a dull moment.

Sleaford Mods, the highly influential post-punk/punk-rap duo comprised of vocalist Jason Williamson and DJ Andrew Fearn, will return to Green Man festival for the first time since 2017, and arrive now as a headline act following their incredible success in recent years.

Listen to “Jobseeker” by Sleaford Mods below:

Also headlining this year’s event, and also returning to Green Man as a headliner following a performance in a past year, is New York-based indie folk group Big Thief. Since playing the festival in 2019, Big Thief have added two critically acclaimed albums to their total of five, combining profound, masterful lyrics with incisive and blissful folk instrumentation in the process.

Listen to “Spud Infinity” by Big Thief below:

The third headliner is English musician and producer Jon Hopkins, who’s combining of electronic music with contemporary classical music, resulting in transcendent musical beauty, will sure to have a spellbinding effect come August. The last, but certainly not least, headliner comes in the form of  neo soul and alternative R&B star Sampha, who will bring his unique musical prowess to the Brecon Beacons for all to witness.

Tickets are, unfortunately, now sold out, but you can sign up for resale tickets here.

‘Call’ OUT NOW taken from our upcoming album ‘Happenings’ out 5th July – the album is about pure joy and takes you on a psychedelic trip through the dance floor to the mosh pit x Now available to pre-order: https://t.co/2tbXhLPjIs pic.twitter.com/LTzATETYnB

— KasabianHQ (@KasabianHQ) February 21, 2024

The release date of Happenings will coincide with and come a day before a huge show at Leicester’s Victoria Park entitled Summer Solace II, the sequel to their original homecoming gig Summer Solace that came back in 2014. And if their new single is anything to go by, Summer Solace II will combine super energetic dance music with the classic Kasabian indie rock sound their fans know and love.

Watch the music video for “Call” below:

Speaking to NME on the creation of “Call“, frontman Serge Pizzorno says of the song, “It’s really quite funky at the start, then it goes floaty and takes you somewhere else. It still bangs, but you’re like, ‘Holy shit, now I’m floating away’. In a really short space of time, it takes you a journey which is really fucking cool.”

And alluding to playing the track in a live setting, he adds, “It’s such a unique tune. At the start of an album campaign, to have something that can only be Kasabian is important. I don’t really know what is, but I do feel like it just has those drops that will just go off in a live environment. Let’s start the year with a tune that gets everyone excited for the summer.”

Kasabian formed in 1997 in Leicester, releasing their debut self-titled album Kasabian in 2004. This first album peaked at number 5 in the UK Albums Chart, and remains the only album released by the band to not reach number 1 in the UK. The band released a further 6 albums before lead vocalist left the band in July 2020, with Sergio Pizzorno taking up frontman duties ever since. The group’s most recent and seventh album, The Alchemist’s Euphoria, came in 2022.

Watch Kasabian perform “Shoot The Runner” at Summer Solace in 2014:

You can purchase tickets for Summer Solace II, scheduled to take place on July 6 2024 at Victoria Park in Leicester, here.

Pre-order Happenings here.

It’s go time! The lineup for #EOTR2024 is here. Explore the full lineup and book your tickets here: https://t.co/zGKGdovsd8
(1/5) pic.twitter.com/pYaRg3duJG

— EndOfTheRoadFestival (@EOTR) February 7, 2024

The festival returns to Lamar Tree Gardens in Wiltshire and will take place from 29 August until 1 September 2024. One of Britain’s best alternative rock and folk festivals, it traces its roots back to 2006, and has since won a number of festival awards, including ‘Best Small Festival’ at the 2011 UK Festival Awards and ‘Best Small Festival’ at the NME Awards in 2016, 2017 and 2019.

Bristol rock favourites Idles will end their summer with an appearance at End Of The Road before jetting off for their second North American tour of the year later in September. The post-hardcore heavyweights return to Lamar Tree Gardens having performed at the Big Top stage back in 2018.

Shoegaze giants Slowdive will cap off a heavy summer schedule filled with European festival shows with a headline appearance at this year’s event. The group released their fifth studio Everything Is Alive last September, returning with their signature shoegaze sound that continues to delight fans new and old.

Watch the music video for “Sugar For The Pill” by Slowdive below:

Another headlining act is Swedish artist Fever Ray, AKA Karin Dreijer, formerly part of electronic music duo The Knife. Dreijer will bring their illuminating, experimental art-pop for all to witness next summer and will be joined by folk hero Will Oldham, better known professionally as Bonnie “Prince” Billy (or Palace in his formative years). Once labelled an ‘Appalachian post-punk solipsist’, the DIY folk singer is known for both his ability to transcend sub-genres of folk, making them his own, and for his enigmatic and wholly spiritual live shows. His upcoming first appearance at Britain’s premier folk festival is, therefore, long overdue.

Watch the music video for “I See A Darkness” by Bonnie “Prince” Billy below:

End Of The Road festival saw King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard and Allah-Las perform last year, and past years have seen acts like Jeffrey Lewis, Patti Smith, Tame Impala and Mac DeMarco play. Check out this year’s full line-up here.

Tickets are available to purchase now here.

Kneecap have claimed the UK government blocked the grant, or the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) funding award, worth £15,000 in a bid to “silence” them. The BPI has said it was “disappointed” with the decision made by the government in not approving the grant, despite funding under the Music Export Growth Scheme being recommended by an independent panel.

A letter from Phoenix Law seeking a judicial review of the decision made by Badenoch claims the action is “state-sponsored censorship“, adding that the decision contravenes the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. The law firm also states that the decision violates the Windsor framework, a post-Brexit trade deal that sets out Northern Ireland’s rights in regards to the UK and the EU.

Our team has assembled https://t.co/JhzjuQctZB

— KNEECAP (@KNEECAPCEOL) February 9, 2024

A spokesperson for Kemi Badenoch has said, “We fully support freedom of speech, but it’s hardly surprising that we don’t want to hand out UK tax money to people that oppose the United Kingdom itself.”

Kneecap, posting on X, has said in a statement, “We’ve been blocked from receiving significant music funding because a Tory Minister doesn’t like our art. F*ck the Tories.”

The leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party, an Irish nationalist party in Northern Ireland, Colum Eastwood, has called the decision by Badenoch to overturn the decision to grant the funding “highly irregular”.

He has said, “It would be unacceptable if the British Government had instituted a policy of defunding groups because they support Irish Unity, Scottish Independence, Welsh Independence or any other change to the constitutional status quo. Worse, in the context of Northern Ireland it may represent a breach of the British Government’s obligations under the treaty signed after the Good Friday Agreement which includes a commitment to exercise power on the basis of parity of esteem between communities in the North.”

He added, “Art is meant to be challenging. You don’t have to agree with an artist or group to understand the importance of funding creators who challenge the status quo and the establishment. I have submitted a number of Parliamentary Questions to establish what has happened here. If there has been a change of funding policy to make that more difficult then Kemi Badenoch needs to come clean about it.”

Kneecap, formed in 2017, frequently visit the topic of Irish nationalism in their music and sing in both Irish and English. They have released one album, 3CAG (2018), and plan on touring North America next month.

Listen to “Get Your Brits Out” below:

This LP, announced back on November 29 with the release of the record’s lead single “Jamcod”, will be the band’s latest release since 2017 and will be followed swiftly by a UK and European tour, commencing with two dates at the Albert Hall in Manchester on March 22 and 23 respectively, and ending at Den Atelier in Luxembourg on April 25.

Listen to “Chemical Animal” below:

“People should expect a Jesus and Mary Chain record, and that’s certainly what Glasgow Eyes is,” Jim Reid said in a statement. “Our creative approach is remarkably the same as it was in 1984, just hit the studio and see what happens. We went in with a bunch of songs and let it take its course. There are no rules, you just do whatever it takes. And there’s a telepathy there—we are those weird not-quite twins that finish each other’s sentences.”

The Jesus And Mary Chain, founded in 1983 in East Kilbride by brothers Jim and William Reid, who are responsible for the majority of the songwriting, are the source of inspiration behind the band’s sound, and remain the group’s only ever-present members. The pair enlisted Douglas Hart on bass and Murray Dalglish on drums, who was soon replaced by Primal Scream’s Bobbie Gillespie, and released their debut single “Upside Down” in 1984, which was soon followed by their critically acclaimed debut album Psychocandy the following year, an LP that firmly established the group’s popularity in the up-and-coming UK shoegaze scene and brought with it the much-loved fan favourite “Just Like Honey“.

Watch the music video for “Just Like Honey” below:

Their second album, Darklands, proved to be the band’s most successful, reaching number five on the UK Albums Chart. Four more albums followed before The Jesus And Mary Chain disbanded in 1999, with both brothers starting different, yet ultimately unsuccessful, music projects. The band then reunited in 2007 and released their first material in ten years with the single “All Things Must Pass,” before releasing their seventh studio album, Damage And Joy, in 2017.

The current line-up consists of the Reid brothers, of course, along with bassist Mark Crozer, guitarist Scott Von Ryper and drummer Justin Welch.

See below for upcoming The Jesus And Mary Chain tour dates:

22/03/2024 – Albert Hall – Manchester
23/03- Albert Hall – Manchester
25/03 – 3Olympia – Dublin
26/03 – Limelight 1 – Belfast
27/03 – Usher Hall – Edinburgh
29/03 – Roundhouse – London
30/03 – Roundhouse – London
02/04 – Amager Bio – Copenhagen
03/04 – Pustervik – Gothenburg
05/04 – Rockefeller – Oslo
06/04 – Munich Brewery – Stockholm
07/04 – Plan B. – Malmo
09/04 – Markthalle – Hamburg
11/04 – Huxleys – Berlin
12/04 – Live Music Hall – Cologne
13/04 – Elysée Montmartre – Paris
15/04 – L’Usine – Geneva
16/04 – Salzhaus – Winterthur
17/04 – Alcatraz – Milan
19/04 – Donaufestival – Krems
20/04 – Halle O2 – Heidelberg
21/04 – Roadburn Festival – Tilburg
23/04 – AB – Brussels
24/04 – Paard – Den Haag
25/04 – Den Atelier – Luxembourg

Tickets for these shows are available to purchase here.

Surprise! We have a new EP coming out next month.

Pre-order/pre-save Fantasies – https://t.co/ztMSLZkRu6

Stream Fantasneeze – https://t.co/6vv8966oKg pic.twitter.com/hph7m0cLIi

— Bombay Bicycle Club (@BombayBicycle) January 9, 2024

This latest unexpected venture that will surely please fans of the indie rock group comes after the release of their latest studio album, My Big Day, which was released in October of last year via Island Records. Bombay Bicycle Club have also released a new single, “Fantasneeze“, that will feature on the new EP, featuring London-based indie folk singer Matilda Mann.

Listen to “Fantasneeze”, a sneak peek of Fantasies, below:

Fantasies enlists the help of several other musicians, featuring English singer-songwriters Matilda Mann, Liz Lawrence, Rae Morris and Lucy Rose, rendering the EP a ‘Bombay and Friends record’, according to the band. The band has also stated that the EP is “a continuation of My Big Day as it was recorded around the same time and in the same spirit”.

Formed in 2005 in Crouch End, London, Bombay Bicycle Club has continually been at the forefront of the UK indie rock scene, while at various points also experimenting with different genres such as indie folk and electronica. The group consists of lead vocalist, guitarist and pianist Jack Steadman, otherwise known as Mr Jukes by those who know, guitarist Jamie MacColl, bassist Ed Nash and drummer Suren de Saram. Since releasing their first album, I Had the Blues But I Shook Them Loose, in 2009, the band has gone on to cultivate a strong cult following, releasing a total of six albums, with their latest, My Big Day, coming in October last year.

Fantasies can be pre-ordered here.

See below for the band’s upcoming UK and Ireland tour dates:

29/01/2024 – The Telegraph Building – Belfast
30/01 – 3Olympia Theatre – Dublin
31/01 – 3Olympia Theatre – Dublin
02/02 – O2 Academy – Birmingham
03/02 – The Brighton Centre – Brighton
05/02 – Bristol Beacon – Bristol
06/02 – Rock City – Nottingham
08/02 – Sheffield Octagon – Sheffield
09/02 – Norwich Nick Rayns LCR UEA – Norwich
10/02 – Cambridge Corn Exchange – Cambridge
12/02 – Barrowland – Glasgow
13/02 – Barrowland – Glasgow
14/02 – O2 Academy – Leeds
15/02 – O2 City Hall – Newcastle
16/02 – O2 Apollo – Manchester
17/02 – O2 Guildhall – Southhampton
18/02 – Great Hall, Cardiff University Student Union – Cardiff

You can purchase tickets for these live shows here.

We’re excited to announce the line-up for this year’s #TeenageCancerGigs at the @RoyalAlbertHall!

Tickets on sale Friday 12 Jan at 9:00am https://t.co/e6jo2B8WzP pic.twitter.com/G6BQLZs2tx

— Teenage Cancer Trust (@TeenageCancer) January 8, 2024

The event will kick off on Monday, March 18, with The Who, backed by an orchestra, and special guests Squeeze. There will be a night of comedy on Tuesday, March 19, with the full line-up to be announced soon, and Wednesday, March 20 will see The Who and Squeeze welcomed back to the Royal Albert Hall for the second time. Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds will then perform on Thursday, March 21, along with indie rock special guests Blossoms.

Friday, March 22 will see Scottish progressive hip-hop group Young Fathers kick off the weekend, followed by a headline Saturday show from The Chemical Brothers, alongside DJ James Holroyd, on March 23. The week-long fundraising extravaganza will conclude on Sunday, March 24 with an Ovation, bringing together the likes of Roger Daltrey, Kelly Jones, Paul Weller, Robert Plant, Pete Townshend and Eddie Vedder to commemorate 24 successful years of performing live music for the Teenage Cancer Trust.

The celebrations come with a hint of sadness, however, as this year’s event will see Roger Daltrey stepping down from his role as curator for the Teenage Cancer Trust annual concerts. Since starting in 2000, performing at the first live Teenage Cancer Trust gig with his band, The Who frontman Daltrey has been at the centre of every annual celebration. He has unceasingly inspired countless musicians to come together and perform for a very special cause year upon year, and he will now allow a series of guest curators to take up the task.

Noel Gallagher, on the positive impact the Teenage Cancer Trust has had, said, ‘The TCT continue to make a real difference to teenagers in what undoubtedly must be the most challenging years of their lives. Having performed at the very first event back in 2000 it is a charity very close to my heart.  24 years and counting is a triumph in itself. NGHFB will be there en masse. Together we will make the night unique. I’d buy a ticket if I were you.”

Tickets go on sale from 9am Friday January 12 and will be available to purchase here.

Donations to the Teenage Cancer Trust can be made here.

The project aims to preserve the musical heritage of the city by amassing a collection of visual memories in the form of concert tickets, thereby allowing both us in the present and those in future generations to resonate with and relive live music performances by some of the world’s greatest artists.

One of these is Bruce Springsteen, whose performance with The E Street Band in July 2013 inaugurated the First Direct Arena. Such a massive moment in the musical history of Leeds is now documented, visually in the form of an actual physical ticket, in the archive for others to enjoy and celebrate. A show by the iconic Irish rock band U2 is another among the remarkable performances recorded on the platform. They played Elland Road on July 1st 1987, where tickets were £14 and Special Guests were promised.

The archive also remembers Sir Elton John’s 1984 gig at The Queens Hall during his European Express Tour. The ticket reminded a commenter on the archive post about their experience at the gig as they stated, “I was at this gig! Elton played at the now demolished Queens Hall (tram shed) and it was truly one of the best gigs I’ve ever been to!“.

Louise Birch, the senior librarian at Leeds Libraries, recounts how the project came to be, saying, “The project came about as I was going through some of my own ticket stubs that I’d collected over the years, and I realised that many venues don’t actually issue physical tickets anymore.

“Leeds has hosted some of the biggest names in music over the years along with a thriving local gig scene and some incredible venues that have become a huge part of the city’s story.

“Every single one of these tickets also represents a unique memory for the person who went to that gig and what we really want is for people to share those memories and experiences and help us build a living, constantly evolving archive of live music in Leeds.”

The librarians who run the archive are actively trying to increase the collection and are on the lookout for particular gigs, including Jimi Hendrix at The Odeon in 1967, The Sex Pistols at Leeds Polytechnic in 1976, Nirvana at The Duchess in 1989 and Oasis at The Duchess in 1994.

The Leodis archive can be accessed here: https://www.leodis.net/.

The sale of 5.9 million units this year is the highest amount of vinyl records sold in a single year in the UK since 1990. This past week, with the aid of Christmas sales, set yet another record with 250,000 records being sold in the UK, the highest amount for any week since the start of the 21st century.

The immense popularity of vinyl sales this year can positively be attributed to a number of artists, not least American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift, who has a staggering three albums in the top 10 biggest-selling records this year. Swift, unsurprisingly then perhaps, also claimed the honour of being the artist behind the year’s best-selling album. Her LP 1989 (Taylor’s Version), a re-recording of Swift’s fifth album, 1989, originally released in 2014, sold 78,767 units. The other Swift albums that made the top 10 list include the other album she re-recorded this year, Speak Now (Taylor’s Version), and her latest original studio LP Midnights.

The Rolling Stones album Hackney Diamonds, released in October this year, came second in the top 10 list and is followed closely by Lana Del Rey’s Did You Know There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd. Other albums to feature in the list include Blur’s latest LP The Ballad of Darren, Fleetwood Mac classic Rumours, Pink Floyd’s iconic The Dark Side of the Moon, and Lewis Capaldi’s Broken by Desire to be Heavenly Sent.

Commenting on the recent surge in popularity of vinyl records, BPI chief executive Dr Jo Twist OBE said, “Led by vinyl, the resurgence of physical product underlines the resilience of the UK music market at a time when streaming consumption continues to hit record levels.

She continued, “Whilst LP sales have now been on an upward path for the past 16 years, it is encouraging to see a stabilisation in demand for CD, as well as new generations of music fans falling in love with the cassette. It is giving people more choice than ever in how they enjoy their favourite music.”

The resurgence in popularity of the vinyl record is a trend not likely to slow down anytime soon, despite streaming services dominating the airwaves. The pleasure of physically owning an LP and adding it to a colourful and diverse collection are among the reasons for buying records, as American anti-folk singer-songwriter Jeffrey Lewis eloquently illustrates in his 2019 single ‘LPs‘. Watch the music video below: