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Originating from Cornwall’s vibrant garage-rock scene, The Velvet Hands relocated to London, where they’ve become prominent figures in the underground guitar circuit. Their music draws comparisons to bands like The Strokes, The Cribs, and The Clash, characterized by punchy guitar riffs and rousing punk choruses. The band has previously supported notable acts such as Fontaines D.C., Paul Weller, and Liam Gallagher. They’ve also graced stages at major festivals, including the Isle of Wight and Y Not festivals.

The band’s mini tour will commence on January 28 at The Saltbox, Nottingham and finish on February 1 at the Old Bakery Studios, Truro. Notably, their Old Bakery Studios show will be part of Independent Venue Week 2025, featuring The Sneaky Feelings as guest support. Continuing with their live shows after, The Velvet Hands will play their biggest-ever show on March 22 at Dingwalls, London. 

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Their debut album, ‘Party’s Over‘, released in 2018, received significant acclaim, with NME describing them as “full of bolshy spirit”. The album was also named Huw Stephens’ Album of the Week on BBC Radio 1. In 2023, they released their second album, ‘Sucker Punch‘, which further solidified their reputation in the UK indie scene. The album features the track ‘Holiday in My Head’ which blends the band’s signature 1970s new wave and 2000s indie influences.

Tickets for these events are available through various platforms, including See Tickets and AXS. You can follow the band on Instagram for further updates.

Quick Panda Productions, the brains behind The Great Estate Festival and Little Orchard have announced plans for their newest event, Paradhis Festival (pronounced para-dees), set to commence in the UK next summer.

Taking place at the historic Boconnoc Estate, famous for its Elizabethan foundations and home to various Prime Ministers, the centre will transform into a place of musical performances as well as meditation, yoga and wellness activities.

The festival is set to take place from Friday 5th to Sunday 7th July 2024, and will house a variety of activities that are suitable for all ages, backgrounds and beliefs. Globally revered Californian yoga teacher and wellness advocate Shiva Rea will take the lead on executing and overseeing the events throughout the weekend.

Sound bath experiences, Wim Hoff workshops, barefoot running, forest bathing and deer safaris in the local deer park are among some of the exciting activities due to take place at Cornwall’s newest festival. In addition to the various wellness events, Paradhis will also have UK electronic group Morcheeba headlining the festival. Other musical acts performing at next year’s festival include Scott Matthews, Afriquoi, Facesoul, Hang Massive and many more to be announced.

Paradhis organisers Ian Whittaker and Ben Hall said: “We always felt that Cornwall has been missing an event that is largely focused on well-being. There is such a diverse range of incredible facilitators, well-being practitioners, nature enthusiasts and an amazing community in Cornwall that deserves its own gathering to celebrate and share this wealth of diversity. Boconnoc Estate is quite simply the perfect venue to launch this event.”

Clare Fortescue of Boconnoc Estate has stated: “We’re thrilled that Quick Panda is launching Paradhis Festival at Boconnoc. Spending time at Boconnoc Estate allows guests and visitors to truly retreat in nature, and hit pause on daily life, so we couldn’t think of a better venue for a festival like Paradhis that combines wellness and music.”

A limited number of “Early Riser” tickets are available now for Paradhis festival 2024. This is a weekend camping ticket that will give you full access to the entire event. “Early Riser” tickets are £95 however as this festival is suitable for all the family, there are various ticket prices depending on age.

For tickets, full line up and more information, head to the official Paradhis website. Also, to learn more about other Quick Panda Productions events, you can head to their website.

Both acts are storming the music industry within their respective genres with multiple BBC, BRIT and DJ awards between them. With hundreds of more acts still to be announced, the festival caters to all music tastes booking indie, pop, rock and dance artists alike. Stormzy has become a household name in the music industry, gracing his way through a wide span of music genres like a knife through butter. He rose to fame through his Wicked Skengman series of freestyles over classic grime beats going on to win multiple awards such as a MOBO in 2014 and British Album of The Year at the BRITs amongst others.

Party starters, Chase and Status released their latest album 2 Ruff Vol. 1 on October 27 this year. The album included their popular single ‘Badadan’ featuring Bou and Flowdan which came out earlier this year in July. 

The duo have also collaborated with UK dance vocalist, Becky Hill on their joint single ​​‘Disconnect’. Hill will be playing her own set at Boardmasters next summer. The singer is known for a multitude of collaborations on tracks such as ‘Afterglow’ with Wilkinson, ‘Gecko’ with Oliver Heldens and ‘Crazy What Love Can Do’ with David Guetta. 

Other dance artists who will be on the bill include the experimental, electronic duo Bicep, who originate from Belfast, Northern Ireland. They have been hailed by the BBC as “one of the biggest names in UK dance” and have had music debuting at number two on the UK Official Albums Chart and number one on the UK Official Vinyl Albums. This led to two BRIT Award nominations. 

Last year the headliners included Lorde, Liam Gallagher and Florence and The Machine. Previous years have seen acts such as The Chemical Brothers, Ed Sheeran, Calvin Harris and Two Door Cinema Club. However some years, the festival had to be cancelled due to poor weather and COVID-19.

The festival was founded in 1981 as a surfing competition and became a home for new music acts in 2005, with festival goers camping at Watergate Bay. The event now consists of surfing and skateboarding competitions happening in and around the town of Newquay and artists playing on stages overlooking the sea. There is currently a maximum capacity of 53,000 surf and music enthusiasts who attend each year. With plenty more artists still to be announced, this festival is one not to miss.

Check out the full line-up below! Tickets are available here

Having grown up with a Welsh-speaking Mum and a Cornish speaking Dad, Gwenno is fluent in both languages. It’s something that came to the fore in her 2018 album Le Kov, which was sung entirely in Cornish. That continues to be the case here, with the Mên-an-Tol standing stones in Cornwall being the inspiration behind this song.

Gwenno explains that “I was inspired by Ithell Colquhoun’s ‘The Living Stones’ as well as the eternal nature of these ancient monuments and how they enable us to reflect on our own nature as human beings and on our relationship to the landscape …. I wanted to share a different and quieter side to the record, one that is grounded in … ambient Celtic music, film scores, and experimental electronic music …. I hope that this collection of songs will serve as a small and helpful reminder of how powerful the sound of gentleness and beauty is.“

Tresor
01.07.22
to pre-order https://t.co/0llNFZ3wj4 pic.twitter.com/ViAWX4cbQU

— G W E N N O (@gwennosaunders) March 2, 2022

The album was written before the lockdown and completed in Gwenno’s Cardiff home with Rhys Edwards producing, and its release will be accompanied by a short film made by Gwenno and filmmaker Clare Marie Bailey. The record’s promised to be “an introspective focus on home and self, a prescient work echoing the isolation and retreat that has been a central, global shared experience over the past two years.“

If you’re interested in hearing for yourself what new stuff she’s been up to, you can pre-order the album at this link. As for seeing her live, you can look for tickets here and see some upcoming UK dates below.

Gwenno UK Tour Dates

04/30/2022 – Stag and Dagger – Edinburgh
01/05 – Various Venues – Glasgow
05/05 – Central Live Music Venue – Wrexham
03/06 – In it Together – Port Talbot
03/09 – O2 Ritz Manchester – Manchester
17/09 – O2 Academy Leicester – Leicester

Support artists announced for Nine Inch Nails live at @EdenProject 2022.

17 June with @Nitzer_Ebb
Remaining tickets: https://t.co/8AGTbNmY0G

18 June with @YvesTumor
SOLD OUT pic.twitter.com/SCgkGQhNGr

— nine inch nails (@nineinchnails) March 14, 2022

Nine Inch Nails will bring their ferocious show to the extraordinary venue for these unmissable shows, set within the stunning grounds of the Eden Project, which has seen past performances from the likes of Pulp, PJ Harvey, Muse, Oasis and Queens Of The Stone Age. In other news, Nine Inch Nails was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, headquartered in Cleveland, alongside Depeche Mode, The Doobie Brothers, Whitney Houston, The Notorious B.I.G., and T. Rex back in 2020.

NIN bring their show, hailed by The Guardian as ‘saw toothed,‘ with the ‘ferocity of a Rottweiler gnashing through its muzzle, bathed in exquisite monochromatic lighting and smoke’ to the lush grounds described by The Times, according to a press release as ‘Magical…half Glastonbury, half Glydnenbourne’ and of which the Evening Standard wrote ‘The nearest you can get to watching a gig on the moon.’ It seems that the band are keeping up their tradition of playing only the grandest, most elaborate venues whenever they come to the UK. Their last show at The Royal Albert Hall saw them go through a career-spanning setlist of 23 songs, anticipation for the Eden Project shows couldn’t be higher.

NIN has also announced an 11 date US tour to accompany the Eden Project dates. Their first tour since 2018, will take them around North America to the likes of Denver’s Red Rocks Amphitheatre, the Cleveland Blossom Music Center, and a few festival appearances like Primavera Sound LA, and Atlanta’s Shaky Knees Festival. While this announcement came with no other UK dates or any new music since the band’s double album (Ghosts V: Together and Ghosts VI: Locusts), both may well be on the horizon quite soon. Who knows? If you’re desperate for some new Trent Reznor music though, you may be (weirdly enough) swayed by the most recent Halsey album, If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power. Reznor lent a producing hand to the album, and between this and Halsey’s standard empowering sound, the project exceeded the expectations of many.

The group will be playing at the Eden Project in Cornwall, with two sessions set for June 17^th and 18^th, and they won’t be alone. Other artists due for some summer gigs include Britpop icon Noel Gallagher (appearing June 15^th), Canadian superstar Bryan Adams (June 29^th) and even classic sixties singer Diana Ross will be making an appearance. But if that seems to have wetted the event’s doomer-gloom appeal for you, My Chemical Romance should make up for it, with their two dates set for May 16^th-17^th.

Nine Inch Nails Return to the UK
Tickets on sale to the public Friday, February 18 at 10am local time.https://t.co/nK3LX1ddbL#NINONTOUR pic.twitter.com/XrIAZdhuW7

— nine inch nails (@nineinchnails) February 14, 2022

It should be a good one, or at least that’s what the reviews say. According to a Guardian review back in 2018, they’ve still got it, describing their performance as “saw toothed,‘ with the ‘ferocity of a Rottweiler gnashing through its muzzle, bathed in exquisite monochromatic lighting and smoke“. And the Eden Project isn’t too shabby a place either, with the Evening Standard assuring us that it’s “the nearest you can get to watching a gig on the moon”.

To be fair to Reznor, he hasn’t been bone idle the last four years. Apart from releasing two positively received albums with Nine Inch Nails back in 2020, he and fellow NIN member Atticus Ross have also been working with American pop-star Halsey, helping on her album If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power. And the awards just keep coming. Nine Inch Nails got inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame back in 2020, and along with that Reznor/Ross even have another Academy Award to put on their shelves, right next to their trophy for 2010’s The Social Network. This time it comes from the soundtrack to the 2020 Pixar movie Soul.

If you’re interested in seeing Reznor & co. perform live, pre-sale tickets were available yesterday. However, if you’re an Eden Project Member, you haven’t missed all your perks, with special access to tickets arriving tomorrow from 10 am. After that, the general sale starts this Friday at 10 am. If you’re interested in more details, you can look here. If you fancy a trip to America just to see them, look here. Otherwise, let’s just hope these last four years haven’t whetted their appetite for the raucous performances that made them such a compelling name in the past.

Organisers boast “A brand new series of events, set on the beautiful golden sands of Perranporth beach in Cornwall. With a sea view as a stunning backdrop, sand at your feet & the sun on your back, these events will be truly unique. Born from the incredible live music that has been happening at The Watering Hole, the UK’s only venue on a beach and the organisers of Tunes in the Dunes festival. This is a first of its kind series of events in Perranporth, not to be missed.” Perranporth is three miles of sandy beach with some of the best waves in the country, complete with a natural tidal pool and an Atlantic ocean view. This makes for a spectacular setting for concerts.

Alongside Bands in the Sands, the aptly named ‘Tunes in the Dunes’ is also slated for the Summer of 2021. Rescheduled to the first weekend of September, this three-day festival taking place at the same picturesque venue will host headlining acts Tom Walker, Richard Ashcroft and a beach party by Craig David. Various glamping opportunities are available on sites near the beach, including the intriguing Shire Hut’s. These life-sized hobbit hole cabins built with local materials will make for a cosy high end stay. As Tunes in the Dunes enters its sixth year of operation, it is set to become the biggest instalment of the festival yet, hoping to bounce back in tandem with other small festivals across the nation after the pandemic struggle.

Meanwhile, Hot Chip will headline the Point Stage with a special DJ set on August 8. However, these are not the only new names to an otherwise busy list. Other acts include AKA Juan, The Good Old Fashioned Lover Boys, and The Menendez Brothers.

There’s also Designate & Apostle, Crawford, Olivia Dean, ONO and Redlight. Tickets are available here. For the full line up as of today, check out the flyer below.

On February 5, Boardmasters announced the first wave of acts for 2020. The 1975, Skepta and American rock band Kings Of Leon were announced as headliners. The festival runs from August 5-9 at Fistral Beach and Watergate Bay in Newquay, Cornwall.

Skepta will headline on Friday, with Kings of Leon on the day after, and The 1975 closing the festival, which this year marks its 40th anniversary.

Other acts scheduled for the festival include Little Simz, Dizzee Rascal, Mura Masa, Sam Fender, Damian “Jr Gong” Marley, Example and The Kooks. Indie acts Mabel and Loyle Carner are also billed.

Boardmasters 2019 was canceled due to severe weather, with a yellow weather warning issued by the Met Office. 

Acts scheduled for last year’s run included Florence & The Machine, Foals, Giggs and Razorlight.

Boardmasters said in response to the cancellation: “The safety of you, the fans and attendees, as well as performers and crew comes first, and the potential risk is too severe for the event to go ahead at this time.” 

They added: “We sincerely regret the disappointment to fans, and apologise for any disruption caused to local businesses, performers and crew who were looking forward to Boardmasters as much as we were”. 

Furthermore, this year marks the festival’s 40th anniversary. Skepta will headline on Friday, with Kings of Leon on the day after, and The 1975 closing the festival.

Other acts scheduled for the Cornwall festival include Little Simz, Dizzee Rascal, Mura Masa, Sam Fender, and The Kooks. Indie acts Mabel and Loyle Carner are also billed. Check out the full line up from their Twitter post below.

Our BIGGEST EVER LINE up is here!

Celebrate 40 years of Boardmasters with headliners @KingsOfLeon@Skepta & @the1975 – PLUS @thekooksmusic@DizzeeRascal, @LoyleCarner@samfendermusic@damianmarley@LittleSimz@liannelahavas@Mabel & 100’s more!

https://t.co/gykDmhrryipic.twitter.com/Xs7N2yCTd2

— Boardmasters (@boardmasters) February 4, 2020

Boardmasters was last year canceled due to severe weather. Organizers of the event declared that it’d been officially postponed on Tuesday night. A yellow weather warning was issued by the Met Office. 

Acts scheduled included Florence & The Machine, Foals, Franz Ferdinand and the Wu-Tang Clan. Others scheduled included grime icon Giggs, Razorlight, and Jorja Smith.

Boardmasters issued a statement: “The safety of you, the fans and attendees, as well as performers and crew comes first, and the potential risk is too severe for the event to go ahead at this time.” 

They added: “We sincerely regret the disappointment to fans, and apologise for any disruption caused to local businesses, performers and crew who were looking forward to Boardmasters as much as we were”. 

Weather permitting, 2020 should be a big year for the Newquay festival-goers. Tickets are available for purchase now and can be found at the link here.