Outlines Festival 2017: The Review

Friday 3 March

Returning for its second year, Sheffield’s Outlines Festival feels less like a warm-up to Tramlines, its summertime sibling, than a welcome shot of colour in a cold grey March. Brimming with emerging talent and underground headliners, it's the kind of festival that encourages you to take chances and consistently rewards the adventurous. 

A handy booklet guides you between venues, which themselves are welcoming, well-staffed and lively. You can tell it’s well-organised but the atmosphere is casual, with plenty of smiles and minimal frisking. Bar queues are short and drinks are affordable; an ancillary benefit of a city festival is escaping extortionate beer prices and heavy premiums on festival food – which can be delicious, but so can kebab shops (shout out to Aslan’s).

A short walk from the wristband exchange is the venue known as Plug, home to two of Outlines' five stages. Yassassin (not the Bowie cover band we thought they might be) help us shake off the cold with some irrepressibly fuzzy rock’n'roll driven by punchy drums, surf guitar and melodic vocal hooks. With gravelly lead vocals and choral whooping, they recall The Runaways and Lush, but with more polka dots and tambourine.

Yassassin at Outlines Festival 2017, photo: Gary Wolstenholme

One room over, we catch one of the weekend’s stand-out sets from Bahraini-born psych jam band Flamingods. With a focus on rhythm, the group layer Eastern melodies over funky basslines to create a sound that's much bigger than the sum of its parts. Unusual instruments are put through heavy doses of effects, creating a warm, jangling soundscape that’s both immersive and a little off-kilter.

Frequently switching up instruments, the band often double up on percussion, building foot-stomping counter-rhythms that leave the room shaking. The set starts off mellow but builds into an all-out punk carnival as frontman Kamal Rasool throws off his shell-encrusted hat and incites a mosh pit with considerable fervour.

Rounding off Friday are dark psych rock outfit The Wytches and they duly pack out The Harley, the weekend’s bastion for all things wild and weird. Powered by swampy Black Sabbath riffs (and t-shirts) and aberrant lead guitar, the Brighton-based trio invite many comparisons but are undeniably accomplished and compelling. They’re also impressively tight, maintaining a crunching rhythm underneath layers of fuzz and feedback. The crowd are psyched and kids are crowdsurfing, reflecting what The Wytches deliver – a dark but wholly invigorating live show.

Saturday 4 March

Saturday starts with a clear sky and a predictably unclear head, but Bristol duo Alimony Hustle go down better than a strong Bloody Mary. Billed as 'the non-White Stripes’, the two-piece tear through short pop-punk songs with immediate hooks and chiming melodies.

They have a wry, effable sense of humour that draws you in (instantly given away by drummer Matt Mndolo’s One Direction/Unknown Pleasures t-shirt). "If you think we got better at songwriting for that one, that's because it was a cover," announces lead singer and guitarist Leah Pritchard after a solid rendition of Joyce Manor’s Constant Headache. She needn’t worry – Alimony Hustle's tight, well-crafted songs simply bubble with potential.

Alimony Hustle at Outlines Festival 2017, photo: Jenn McCambridge

Next up are Logs, the low-key supergroup comprised of members from Drenge, Wet Nuns, Menace Beach and Seize the Chair. The excitement around these guys is palpable and The Harley is packed. Driven by Rory Loveless’ relentless drumming, Logs rework the sounds of their constituent parts into a grungy sludge, characterised by a heavy groove and masterful dynamic changes. 

Occupying another, jazzier part of the spectrum are Katie Pham & The Moonbathers. The local three-piece possess the same kind of wobbly surf guitar and thoughtful irreverence as artists like Mac Demarco, Homeshake and The Growlers, soothing the room with tracks like Sweet Potato and Guinness Paltrow. With funky basslines and and shimmering chord changes, they're fast becoming local favourites. 

Bathed in reverb, lo-fi disciples The Orielles sound more like West Coast indie rockers than a young band from Halifax. With elements of Best Coast, Alvvays and L7, the youthful trio capture a soothing DIY haze that has seen them steadily build a committed national fanbase, evident today as the room seems to transform into a branch of Urban Outfitters. It’s clear why they attract such a following; their dreamy upbeat rock is filled with fiery guitar licks and buoyant rhythm changes. They’re a carefree bunch but they get down to business as they burn through their set, letting loose and banging heads.

The Orielles at Outlines Festival 2017, photo: Laura Merrill

Formed from the ashes of indie group Nai Harvest, Luxury Death play dark pop powered by girlfriend/boyfriend duo Meg Williams and Ben Thompson. Maybe it’s the weather, or maybe it’s Luxury Death’s art school aesthetic, but the crowd seem a little subdued at first. Their lo-fi sound has great character, making tactical use of feedback and throbbing synth, but it’s also liable to wash over you. That said, the group generate some of their most interesting moments when they loop ideas, jamming on unexpected chord changes and reworking melodies, and by the end of the set the crowd has livened up.

Next up are Nachthexen, a group firmly on the ballot for best band name. Named after (we're assuming) the German nickname for female Soviet bombing pilots in World War II, they drop heavy stabbing synth lines over choppy disco beats; charged with a relentless punk vocal, they stomp through tracks off last year’s self-titled EP as well as new numbers like Panic.

Playing at the same time as more established acts like Lady Leshurr and Cowtown, Nachthexen face something of a dwindling crowd – or perhaps their anxious disco punk just isn’t for everyone. Despite the exodus the Sheffield quartet play hard and fast, challenging the audience to double down on their enthusiasm, which they do in spades. 

Later we head down to Queens Social Club which is shaking to the tropical Glaswegian hip-hop rhythms of Bossy Love. Made up of former Dananananaykroyd drummer John Baillie Jr and Aussie transplant Amandah Wilkinson, of Gold Coast pop group Operator Please, Bossy Love play high energy R'n'B with killer live drums. Wilkinson is a consummate frontwoman, strutting and bouncing and radiating energy: with catchy vocal hooks and funky industrial rhythms, Bossy Love are definitely ones to watch when they return this summer for Tramlines.

Bossy Love at Outlines Festival 2017, photo: Simon Butler

Closing the night are mighty psych drone band Hookworms. Known for their DIY ethic, Queens Social Club seems like the perfect venue for them – humble and unpretentious, and the band build layers of fuzzed-out guitars and synth into a stomping wall of sound that barely lets up from start to finish. Tracks like The Impasse don’t really end, but rather give way to inescapable rolling feedback that begins to bend and pulse until you find yourself in the next song.

Frontman MJ’s acidic vocals aren't so much lyrical as instrumental, guiding the jams through the set. Their stage show consists solely of a wild projection that fizzes and morphs like a frenetic snowstorm (it's still the most elaborate we’ve seen all weekend). With the band in the dark, the result is strangely hypnotic. Although Queens isn’t packed out, the crowd are loud and the energy is high. Once the dust settles on closing track Beginners, the room is filled with heavy applause and slightly dazed faces.

Outlines doesn’t engulf Sheffield like Tramlines does, but the festival spirit does permeate the city centre in excited pockets. It still feels like a secret, shared with a diverse enclave of festival-goers looking for something new. Audiences are loud and receptive, and at every venue you see bands on the roster bouncing in the crowd, sharing in the melee and loosening up after their set.

As with any new festival there are a few growing pains. Small venues like The Harley can fill up in an instant, while larger stages can seem surprisingly spacious for certain headliners, and unfortunate time clashes can drain a venue during a stellar show. But these are minor details in an otherwise solid festival that packs plenty of bang for its buck. Even when viewed as a precursor to Tramlines, Outlines doesn’t feel tacked on or overshadowed, but instead recaptures the restless indie feeling that Tramlines has inevitably outgrown.

In fact, it delivers exactly what a good outline of Tramlines should; a distillation of its vibrant line-up, colourful crowds and boisterous spirit.

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Tickets for Outlines 2018 are now on sale