Ten great bands, DJs until 2am AND free BBQ for just five pounds? It can only be Joyzine’s annual shindig at our favouritest London venue The Windmill in Brixton. This year we’re celebrating 14 years of Joy and the fest promises to be bigger and better than ever before with a line-up that mixes established Joyzine faves with fresh new talent.
It all goes down on Saturday 15th April (that’s the Easter bank holiday weekend, so you’ll have 2 days to recover) from 4.30pm. Advanced tickets, priced at £5, are available here. Keep up to date with news, stage times, etc. on our Facebook page.
South London quartet CuT ‘s frenetic brand of psychedelic space punk has been a firm favourite at Joyzine HQ for a while now. Having garnered a reputation as one of the capital’s most exhilarating live acts and with a slew of great releases on Ra Ra Rok Records, including last year’s Mouth to Mouth EP, theirs promises to be a set not to be missed.
Former frontman of The Brute Chorus James Brute‘s new project takes the mud & blood spattered rock & roll gospel of his previous band and strips it right back to the bone to create modern doom-wop relics that are at turns fragile and monstrous.
Box-fresh Brighton-based garage punk three-piece Scab Hand will be playing their first ever London show at Joyfest, just days after their home town live debut. Featuring members of The Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster and Love Buzzard, expect a squelching fuzz pot of squealing aural mayhem.
Quite how this is The Indelicates‘ first appearance at Joyfest I’m not entirely sure. The south coast duo of Julia & Simon (and their numerous associates) have been big favourites here since we first clapped our ears around their theatrical, kaleidoscopic indie rock sound back in 2005 and they’re not showing any signs of slowing down – following a concept album about the internet fleeing to space to escape the inane babble of humanity (complete with virtual reality music videos) and a music about David Koresh, we can only begin to fathom what their new project Juniverbrecher, due in June might entail.
Norwich-based trio Mega Emotion, formed from the ashes of ace lo-fi cult heroes Bearsuit, describe their sound as ‘an alternative soundtrack to Tron’ and have a penchant for performing in self-crafted ceremonial robes. Since forming in 2015 their DIY mix of synth-pop and scuzzy guitars has found favour with the likes of Steve Lamacq and John Kennedy and earned them support slots with Shonen Knife, Yuck and Drones Club.
Rat The Magnificent put on one of the most wonderfully intense shows to grace our To Hell With Good Intentions night in Croydon last year. Fresh from recording new material and a recent show with Idles, they’ll be bringing their righteous, riotous mix of MBV shimmer and grimey punk back to Brixton.
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Vienna Ditto have become almost an automatic pick for every Joyfest (we think this is their fourth, though we may have missed one). Their voodoo sci-fi blues compound of slide guitar, soulful vocals and blazing electro burst have made them firm favourites around these parts.
Perhaps the only band able to give them a run for their money on the Joyfest count is gothic London rockabilly quartet Bridport Dagger. Expect swinging beats, buzzsaw surf guitar and the occasional bit of standing up drumming.
We first came across London pysch rock & roll quartet Broken Soundtracks at a Roadkill all-dayer, and in our book recommendations don’t come much higher than that. The band released their new single, a split release with Average Sex, through Roadkill Records earlier this month.
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Rounding off a storming line-up are new Oxford based metal tinged grunge four piece Mamzer, whose name may or may not mean something rude in Yiddish. They’ll be making their London debut at Joyfest so make sure you get along early to catch their set.