Friday 11 August 2017

Fantasy Festival #5: The Florence Festival - Lineup

Connie Constance: Connie Constance is a London based singer/songwriter who originally trained to be a dancer, became a poet, and then moved into song. The single she recorded with Jelani Blackman, 'Clouds', reflects this combination of poetry and song. She was tipped by ID as a future soul star in their Class of 2016 piece. She played the Afropunk festival in London late last month.

Georgia: Former footballer and drummer for Kate Tempest, Georgia released her 'post punky hip hop soul' debut album in 2015. She played a number of festivals in 2016, including British Summer Time and Eurosonic, and has just released a new E.P 'Feel It'. She has just played LeeFest, and will be playing Lost Village festival later this month. 

Speech Debelle: Mercury Music prize winner Speech Debelle is a London based rapper and social activist who makes understated, multi layered, narrative urban survival music. She has released two albums and, last year, a self released EP. She is currently touring the UK and is playing Shamabala Festival and Greenbelt Festival in late August. 

Overcoats: Overcoats are a folkatronic or 'folk-soul' duo from New York whose music has been likened to Simon & Garfunkel. They released their debut album earlier this year and are touring the US throughout the summer and autumn. They would have played at all three of the Dot To Dot festivals in late May, but pulled out in the wake of the Manchester Arena bombing.

Kate Tempest: Musician. Novelist. Poet. Playwright. There is seemingly nothing Londoner Kate Tempest cannot do. She headlined The Great Escape in 2015, "moved people to tears at Glastonbury 2017", and was the guest director at Brighton Festival in May. Her current, extremely timely, album Let Them Eat Chaos was released in 2016. She is playing a large number of festivals this summer.

Angel Olsen: Angel Olsen is a singer/songwriter from St Louis, Missouri. She began her musical career with Will Oldham (Palace Brothers, Palace Music) but her 2014 debut took her away from alt. country territory and into dark indie rock. 2016's My Woman married folky strumming to Velvet Underground infused guitar pop and garage rock distorted vocal stomping, all with a dash of eighties synth pop and sixties girl group melodies. It gained fans amongst the staff at Piccadilly Records in Manchester, Florence Welch, and Helen McCookerybook, amongst others. Angel is currently touring Europe, including the UK, and will be touring the US throughout the autumn. Her date at Green Man festival next week has sold out. 

Cat Power: Cat Power, aka Chan Marshall, from Atlanta, Georgia, has been making music since the early 1990s. Her early work featured choppy guitar work and raw vocals. She then went through a slow, minimalist phase, a critically acclaimed soul phase, and has in recent years emerged as a full blown soul electronica artist with anthems such as 'Cherokee' and 'Ruin'. She played a US date last week, but it looks as though no other dates are planned at the moment.

Florence + The Machine: Londoner Florence Welch formed Florence + The Machine in 2007. The name derives from the stage names Welch and keyboardist Isabella Summers gave themselves when writing songs together as teenagers: Florence Robot and Isa Machine. The bands first appearance at Glastonbury in 2007 was later described by Welch as "A complete shambles" and comprised of a muddied, sleep deprived and tearful Florence singing her set acapella until her guitarist arrived. These days, ten years and three albums down the line, Florence + The Machine are a veritable orchestra (there were twelve of them at the last count), no strangers to the festival circuit in the UK, US and Europe, and have headlined Latitude in 2010, Glastonbury in 2015, and British Summer Time in 2016. The band are not currently touring.

No comments:

Post a Comment