Kelburn Garden Party: Introducing The Skinny Stage
We're curating a stage at this year's Kelburn Garden Party – here's a look at the bands and artists we have in store this June
The eccentric, electric Kelburn Garden Party have just announced a second batch of bands, musicians and DJs for this year's festival at Kelburn Castle near Largs, from 29 June to 2 July. We're pretty excited to share the details of The Skinny's very own stage at this year's festival, featuring some of our favourite new bands and artists from across Scotland. We'll be taking over the Pyramid Stage on Saturday 30 June, and we're bringing the following...
Future Get Down: Party-friendly, synth-fuelled and incredibly loud dance music from a band in full beekeeping attire, Future Get Down are an Edinburgh-based electronic outfit fronted by Oliver Kass alongside long-time collaborator and former Homework bandmate Ally Dennis. Expect strobes, synths and to see Kass strutting around "like a psychedelic James Murphy".
SKJØR: The indie four-piece combine dreamy guitars and melodies with Louise McCraw's dark, haunting vocals.
DTHPDL: Combining elements of grunge, krautrock, synth rock and electronica, DTHPDL are a genre-tumbling sight to behold.
Kobi Onyame: The Glasgow-based artist fuses rap, grime, R'n'B and the sounds of his Ghanaian homeland making for seriously catchy music.
CRYSTAL: This Glasgow quartet – who won the public vote to support Paolo Nutini at Edinburgh's Hogmanay in 2016 – do catchy and thrashy well, flitting from punk aggression to sweet balladry in an instant. Vocalists Anna Shields and Blair Crichton emphasise this dichotomy, alternating song to song.
ST.MARTiiNS: Dundee duo Katie Lynch and Mark Johnston craft unique soundscapes combining elements of jazz, lo-fi, electronica and pop, with Lynch's vocals taking everything to the next level.
Super Inuit: Fern Morris and Brian Pokora's 'dark ambient glo-fi' brings to mind the likes of Sylvan Esso, and the duo balance lofty vocals and melodies with some seriously crunchy electronic noise.
Annie Booth: The Mt. Doubt collaborator and Last Night from Glasgow signing presents her folky, emotive and soothing solo material.
Khalid Al Khajah: Al Khajah's mix of neo-soul and electronic R'n'B is an exciting one; his debut EP Open is packed with thumping drums, smooth grooves and wobbly synths, and the Bahraini's vocals are equally impressive.
Lou Mclean: The brilliantly funny and charismatic Leith-based songwriter whose Good Morning Easter Road EP easily won us over last year; you may remember McLean from our Sofar Sounds night at Summerhall back in the autumn.
Also new to this year's Kelburn line-up are Skye synth-folkies Niteworks, acid house great A Guy Called Gerald, and future-soul duo LUNIR. All these new names join a line-up headed by Goldie, Chali 2na and Krafty Kuts, and Ibibio Sound Machine.
Kelburn Garden Party 2018 takes place from 29 Jun – 2 Jul at Kelburn Castle, near Largs; tickets are on sale now via kelburngardenparty.com