Brighton Psych Fest is back for round three this September, bringing more than 40 bands to venues across Brighton for 14 hours of psych, post-punk, krautrock, garage rock, dreamy pop and various other sounds that don’t necessarily fit neatly into a box.
And when they say multi-venue, they mean it. This year’s festival spreads across Brighton Dome’s Corn Exchange, Concorde 2, Komedia, The Hope & Ruin, Volks, Alphabet and Patterns, with one wristband getting you into the lot.
So, who should you be attempting to see while speed-walking between venues? Top of the bill are cult Anglo-French avant-pop legends Stereolab, whose particular cocktail of krautrock, 1960s lounge music and experimental pop has been bending brains since the early ’90s. They’ll be playing the Corn Exchange at 9.45pm, making this a pretty rare opportunity to see them without having to leave Brighton.
They’re joined by Texan genre-hoppers White Denim, Californian psych-rockers Allah-Las and Swedish singer and composer Anna von Hausswolff, plus Welsh psych-pop artist Gwenno, LA post-punk trio Automatic and London dream-pop favourites Night Tapes.
Things get considerably noisier elsewhere on the bill. Manchester’s Mandy, Indiana bring their industrial intensity; while Portuguese trio Maquina. mix krautrock, techno and punk; and The KVB deal in dark, hypnotic post-punk. There are also sets from The Mystery Lights, Holy Wave, Mary in the Junkyard, The Belair Lip Bombs, Lael Neale, Les Big Byrd, Annabelle Chairlegs and plenty more. Elsewhere on the international line-up, there’s the brilliantly named Vancouver punk outfit Piss.
Brighton isn’t just providing the venues, either. Local names on the bill include punk outfit (and BOTI faves) Slag, psych-rockers ELLiS·D, Knives, Highdrive, Lemonsuckr, Floral Image, Bones Ate Arfa and Cordelia Gartside.
The festival comes from Brighton promoters Joy Concerts and the team behind Manchester Psych Fest, which has been doing this sort of thing for more than a decade. Brighton’s version first arrived in 2024 and is now heading into its third year, with the line-up increasingly stretching the definition of psychedelia into the noisier, stranger corners of alternative music.
The main challenge, then, is likely to be deciding who to sacrifice when two bands you want to see inevitably play at the same time. Your wristband gives you access to all the venues, but entry is first come, first served according to capacity, so if there’s someone you’re desperate to see, we’d recommend not leaving that cross-town dash too late.
Forty-plus bands, seven venues and 14 hours of top-notch music for less than £60? Bring it on!
Fri 4th September; 1pm – 3am; from £46
brightonpsychfest.com
