Space for people to come together to enjoy good music and have a good time in an intimate setting.

On the 19th of July 2025, Birmingham's cultural playground Digbeth will come alive as 700 passionate music fans immerse themselves in a full day of live music. 

Across 4 dynamic stages, in 3 of Birmingham’s most influential independent venues Mama Roux’s,The Night Owl and Dead Wax Digbeth. Festival organisers promise music lovers a day that celebrates the raw energy, talent, and creativity fuelling vibrant music scenes. From rising local talent to breakthrough national acts, this alternative all day music festival kicks off at 12pm allowing the chance to see 30+ acts of different genres, backgrounds and stories all within a 10 hour period. 

“Liverpool has ‘Sound City’, Manchester has ‘NBHD’, Leeds has ‘Live at Leeds’, now Birmingham has ‘What’s Happenin’? Digbeth’. We want to grow it every year into something the City can be proud of, that offers more opportunity and more incredible memories as it naturally evolves.” - Festival Curators.

The Line-up so far: Tom A Smith, M60, Keyside, The Manatees, Good Health Good Wealth, Zo Lief, Cusp, Alright, Luca Simian.

Believing that live music should be accessible for everyone, the festival offers a cheaper alternative to majors priced at just £20 for a first wave ticket, working out at 66p per artist. With early-bird tickets selling out in 2 weeks before even having an artist announced, you’d be best snapping up your tickets quickly for this event.
Celebrating the best of Birmingham culture, the festival is partnering and working with many incredible creatives, including local Universities, Brumbox, The Not So Rock Show, Birmingham Updates, local DJ’s and more. With plans to grow further in 2026, what are you waiting for? Get in there early to say “I went to the first one”.

Heavy, alternative music. Low tunings and slow tempos. Independent artists and authentic scenes.

"Oozing with quality, with her sultry tone and catchy bridges, Harriet Rose is paving the way for upcoming Indie-Americana." - RGM

Gigging since the age of 12, Harriet’s music and performances have been highly acclaimed everywhere and she is well known for her ability to draw the audience in and have them hang onto every word. The multi-instrumentalist prides herself on offering a unique Indie/Americana sound with a blend of powerhouse vocals and catchy guitar hooks. Harriet’s songs are often inspired by her own life; the triumphs, trips and tumbles. ​

Harriet is currently in the studio recording with Ed Cosens (Reverend And The Makers) and has recently supported Peter Doherty (The Libertines), Andrew Cushin, Jon McClure, The Lottery Winners, Joe Carnell Jr, James Walsh and The Sherlocks. As well as playing major festivals Tramlines and Rock N Roll Circus, you can also catch Harriet supporting Robbie Williams at Come Together Festival in Newcastle this summer as well as touring up and down the UK.

She describes her own music as “a mix of my dads youth and mine. I was completely influenced until my mid-teens with tunes from The Smiths, Fairground Attraction, Beautiful South - anything my dad grew up on really. When I write, there's definitely a blend of those older vocals with the contemporary indie melodies which I listened to through choice..."

"When Queen famously played Live Aid, they stripped out all unnecessary parts of their songs to leave the pure essentials ensuring as much as possible could be squeezed into their allocated slot. We were reminded of that while watching the Harriet Rose Band who dispensed with such frivolities such as giving song introductions and just concentrated on delivering a set that left you invigorated and glad to be alive to have seen it, packed full of vitality and energy let alone excellent singing and musicianship." - W21 Music

For fans of Jake Bugg, Sigrid, Catfish and the Bottlemen and Amy Mcdonald

Website - https://www.harrietrosemusic.com/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/HarrietRoseMusic

Twitter - https://twitter.com/harrietrose_

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/harrietrosemusic/

Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/artist/7xY5nIAMHDgLiz151awqBE?si=Lpwrkl_nQ4unFV7FgrFCPg&nd=1

The Viz is a four-piece Indie Rock band from Stafford that has built a growing audience over the past year. Their sound draws comparisons to bands like Arctic Monkeys, The Jam, and other Britpop icons. The band has already achieved notable milestones, including selling out shows in Birmingham and performing at iconic venues like The Sugarmill. Known for their electrifying live performances, The Viz delivers a dynamic and engaging experience that leaves audiences wanting more.

Seattle three-piece Helms Alee has announced a new album Keep This Be The 

Way available April 29th via Sargent House. Across the span of their first 

five studio albums, the trio zeroed in on different aspects of their sound 

- a blend of lilting siren songs, crushing Northwest thunder and sludge, 

angular econo-rock, and heady guitar pop while retaining their no-frills, 

meat-and-potatoes approach in the studio. But with this Helms Alee expanded 

have their palette by delving into the production possibilities afforded by 

recording the album themselves, creating their most dynamic and 

technicolored work to date. This new approach is immediately evident on 

first single and album opener “See Sights Smell Smells,” where reverse 

cymbal crashes, fragmented piano, layered drums, woozy drones, saxophone 

freak-outs, and trippy vocal treatments transport the listener to an 

altered state of exhilarated anticipation. The song is accompanied by a 

video created by Allen Watke whose video art consists primarily of analog 

equipment with an emphasis on VHS dubbing, glitching & manipulation. 

When the pandemic hit, guitarist/vocalist Ben Verellen, bassist/vocalist 

Dana James, and drummer/vocalist Hozoji Matheson-Margullis found refuge in 

their music and bunkered down in a makeshift studio in Verellen’s amplifier 

shop. Through the remainder of 2020 and into early 2021, the band wrote an 

album as a distraction from the surrounding turbulence, recording songs 

with the assistance of Ron Harrell as they were writing them, composing the 

material with the added benefit of hearing them come together from the 

engineer’s chair. Keep This Be the Way still very much sounds like a Helms 

Alee record, but it’s their first album that diverts from the faithful 

recreation of their live sound and delves into a vibrant tapestry of 

surreal sounds and invented spaces.

Andrew Cassara returns to Birmingham on his Dead End Disco Tour at Deadwax Digbeth on September 20 2025. Support act to be announced

This will be unavailable to purchase on the evening of the event.

We’re so excited to come back to Birmingham for the In Wonderland tour!

Celebrating the release of our brand new third album; In Wonderland we’re touring the UK with 5 headline shows playing plenty of brand new tracks from the new album, such as Do You Like Me Or Not?, Meltdown and the emotional In Wonderland.

As well as songs from the brand new album, we will also be playing classic tracks such as You’re All That I Want, Recovery and Anything.

Tickets are only £7 online, but will be £10 on the door so get your tickets fast.

Joining us during the evening will be two incredible support bands.

Does life have meaning or a purpose? What distinguishes good from evil? Do individuals enjoy free will or is destiny preordained? Critical thinkers – Sartre, Nietzsche, Dostoevsky – have pondered such questions for centuries. Serene Demon dispatches them in under 39 minutes, reflecting Art d’Ecco’s singular focus on his fourth album: “I was determined, in an almost monomaniacal way, to prove that I can do something different.”

One need only to listen to the title track to recognize his success. Composing “Serene Demon” required two months’ time and deep reserves of creativity. The premise may seem straightforward (“it’s literally an existentialist and a true believer walk into a bar and debate”) but the execution is anything but, incorporating four distinct sections, a fluid tempo, and a myriad of tone colors as it veers between intimate and epic moments across seven and a half minutes.

Likewise, the song’s succinct lyrics belie the enormity of its subject matter. “I've always been fascinated with the seduction of evil that lurks within us, and not just the archetype of the angel and the devil on each shoulder.” Evil can take many forms: self doubt, Imposter Syndrome, the unrelenting darkness of depression and anxiety. Yet out of this miasma, Art d’Ecco emerges triumphant. “That song is the most challenging thing I’ve ever written.”

If you’re going to interrogate the nature of existence, best to live a little first. At the outset of making Serene Demon, our hero did just that. In fall 2022, he rented an apartment in New York City. With cinematic soundtracks from Henry Mancini and Ennio Morricone to John Barry and François de Roubaix in his earbuds, Art explored the City That Never Sleeps. “I would take long, solitary walks. I would sit up at a bar and talk to strangers. I'd go to shows and art galleries by myself. I felt like an Alain Delon character, like in Le Samouraï,” a mysterious loner in a nocturnal world. “Then I’d come back to the piano, have a glass of wine, and write.”

But let’s not oversimplify. For Art d’Ecco, “writing” a song means more than just coaxing forth a melody and sprinkling some rhymes over the top. “I write with tone and sound,” he explains. Are the strings pizzicato or legato? Does that haunting motif call for saxophone or clarinet? No detail escapes

his scrutiny. “Once I've found that, the secret sauce of instrumentation, then it’s on to lyrics that tell the story. That’s the last piece of the puzzle.”

In the months that followed his New York sojourn, Art pushed his limits and took risks, some more successful than others. Ecstatic when Grammy Award-winning producer and engineer Joe Chiccarelli (The White Stripes, The Strokes, Beck, U2) expressed interest in working on his new material, Art soon came to realize that their methods and concepts didn’t align as closely as hoped; after two weeks of production in Vancouver (including some “great ideas” that made it to the final record), they parted ways.

Yet despite his “ferocious, introverted independence,” Art recognized that he couldn’t realize his ambitious vision single-handedly. Nearly 30 musicians contributed to making Serene Demon, and three of the new songs blossomed from collaborative exercises with his rhythm section, drummer Malcolm Holt and bassist Pascal Le Vasseur; for indie disco floor-filler “Tree of Life,” the trio took inspiration from the relentless momentum of the Bee-Gees’ “You Should Be Dancing.”

Serene Demon may be Art d’Ecco’s most ambitious album to date, but fans won’t struggle to recognize his handiwork. For all its hints of mystery, opener “True Believer” picks up the thread of last summer’s non-album single “I Feel Alive.” The push-and-pull of “Tree of Life” could’ve easily propelled it into heavy MTV rotation in the heyday of the Psychedelic Furs, while the slinky “Shell Shock” and its Roland SH-2000 synth grooves evokes memories of Steve Miller’s “Fly Like An Eagle.” Even the audacious title tune is carefully sequenced between a moody instrumental (“Meursault’s Walk,” a nod to Camus’ The Stranger) and an upbeat pop tune (“Honeycomb”) embellished with steel drum.

Like Bowie and Björk, Miles Davis and Kate Bush, Art d’Ecco intends to keep nudging his listeners forward, prompting them to explore - and accept - unfamiliar ideas. “Once you've trained the ear of the audience, it establishes a new precedent,” he concludes. Tastes change and evolve, and outliers mature into icons. “That moves pop music forward in the most beautiful, organic way, and I'm constantly trying to exist within that paradigm. How do I challenge myself and throw the rule book out, but still make this the

catchiest, quirkiest piece of music possible? I like existing between those two worlds.”

Great pop music accommodates big ideas and simple truths with equal finesse, but don’t expect a record - even one as ambitious as Serene Demon - to solve all life’s mysteries. “If you're constantly searching for answers or hope to bestow any relevance to the existence that you're living, then take a pause and realize that life is happening right now,” concludes Art. “You don’t need to constantly defer happiness. Just exist in the moment.”

Yorkshire artist Ellur writes soaring indie guitar songs about growing up and acceptance. Every word counts in eachEllursong, the Halifax artist is a storyteller and lets listeners further into her world with every track.Having already spawned lead singles including its title-track, ‘God Help Me Now’and latest single‘Yellow Light’(BBC Radio 1’s Track Of The Week),Ellur’s new EP (produced by Joel Johnston of Far Caspian) showcases her anthemic sensibilities to perfection, taking influences from contemporaries including Sharon Van Etten, Sam Fender and Dora Jar.Over the past year,Ellurhas certainly established herself as a strong force within the emerging indie landscape with festival appearances at SXSW in Austin Texas, Reading & Leeds Festivals and shows with Robbie Williams and Blossoms. The gifted songwriter has also drawn plaudits throughout the press community (NME, Consequence of Sound, Dork, DIY, The Line of Best Fit, Clash), BBC Radio 1 and BBC 6 Music with plays from Steve Lamacq, Chris Hawkins, Emily Pilbeam, Sian Eleri,Ellurand her fantasticlive band are not ones to miss! “Her sound is majestically taking shape with every new release”NME“A mastery of personal storytelling through song”DIY“A swooning vocal you can almost wallow in”TheLine Of Best F

With an impressive track record of over 500 shows throughout Europe, UK, and Mexico, three studio albums, and a
captivating live record since 2017, Switzerland’s Dirty Sound Magnet is an unstoppable, unbreakable force of rock.
The uniqueness of their mesmerising music and kinetic live performances has won audiences the world over. Their
show is unpredictable; shamanic stage presence, rock star charisma, instrumental prowess, poetic vocals, tantalising
dynamics. Expect the unexpected.
As teenagers hailing from Fribourg, Stavros Dzodzos (guitar, vocals), Marco Mottolini (bass, backing vocals), and
Maxime Cosandey (drums, backing vocals) devoured hundreds of albums, while rehearsing with great intensity. Their
passion rapidly turned into an addiction and total dedication to their art. Years of experimentation and practice led to
the creation of the DSM sound, and the DSM way of life. The plan has always been the same and is quite simple:
“There is no plan B”.
The DNA of this award winning Swiss act can be traced back to the ancestral ‘Golden Age of Rock’ (60s, 70s), but
instead of copying past heroes, Dirty Sound Magnet worked hard on breaking new ground. Their music has been
likened to a fusion of Led Zeppelin's energy and instrumental virtuosity, the raw energy of Iggy Pop, and the mysticism
of The Doors. By infusing modern psych influences like Tame Impala and King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, along
with thought-provoking lyrics reflecting contemporary social turmoil, Dirty Sound Magnet have created their own
distinct musical formula.
Since the release of the band’s third and most successful studio album ‘DSM-III’ (Hummus Records, 2022), Dirty
Sound Magnet have performed over 130 shows including sold out tours in the UK, Germany, and Mexico, and
received the award for ‘Best Swiss Rock Band’ in 2022 - winning it for a second time after 2017. The group began to
attract attention with their 2017 debut album ‘Western Lies’, released under Berlin-based label Noisolution, and
winning the ‘Best Swiss Rock Song’ award for ‘Homo Economicus’. Following on, they toured Europe extensively
throughout 2017 to 2020, establishing themselves within the continent’s burgeoning psychedelic rock scene. Festival
performances ensued such as Switzerland’s Montreux Jazz, Gurten, and Caribana, together with supporting rock
heavyweights such as Wolfmother and Monster Magnet. 2019 saw the band release their ambitious concept album
‘Transgenic’, further solidifying their status. With the world at a standstill during the Covid-19 pandemic, the group
utilised their downtime to record live session album ‘Live Alert’ (2020) - showcasing their other-worldy improvisational
skills. Recorded in just 1 session, the album was a huge success and gained the band many new fans worldwide.
Dirty Sound Magnet's music is in a constant state of evolution, and their upcoming record due in late 2023 with
Australian label Wild Thing Records, is a testament to their artistic progression. As the band continues their ongoing
tour since 2022, this new record will propel them to new continents and connect with diverse audiences.

70s influenced Aussie soft-rocker Joel Sarakula presents new album 'Soft Focus' at Dead Wax, Birmingham on Oct 30th as part of his first UK tour in 15 years. Sarakula has graced the stages of Primavera, SXSW and Glasto over the years and has been championed by the likes of Craig Charles, Mary Anne Hobbes and Lauren Laverne on 6 Music and Radio 2, so don't miss this chance to see Joel Sarakula with band on a rare headline UK show. Expect 70s influenced soft-rock, funk and disco grooves.

Support TBA.

Imagine if Ray Manzarek was the frontman for the Bee Gees... It’s a neat visual introduction to Joel Sarakula, a UK-based Australian artist who writes, producesand sings Soulful Pop, gazing out at a contemporary world through vintage glasses, vintage threads and long blond hair. His music is informed by a rich, 1970s-inspired palette, drawing on soft-rock, funk and disco influences: sunny, uptempo jams for darker times. Self-aware that he looks and occasionally sounds like the love child of Ray Manzarek and the Gibb brothers, his self-deprecating sense of humour is always there just below the fringe.

Born in Sydney, based in UK and international in outlook Sarakula is a songwriter who has travelled the world in search of his muse, experiencing everything from being a victim of Caribbean carjackings to performing in the remote fishing villages of Norway before finally establishing his career in the UK and Europe. Since then he has released albums such as “Island Time” (2023), “Companionship” (2020), “Love Club” (2018) and “The Imposter” (2015) that have racked up plays on rotation across national UK and European radio and got him noticed in The New York Times, The Independent (UK), The Irish Times, Rolling Stone Germany, El Pais (Spain) and Sydney Morning Herald. It’s- been a long road finding his current cult status starting out at the piano from a young age in suburban Sydney, writing and singing songs by the time he was a teenager and onstage by fifteen years old playing jazz standards in his local golf club. “I came from humble beginnings, it’s best not to mention” as he sings in his 70s boogie influenced song “I’m Still Winning”. Joel Sarakula is a fixture on the festival and club circuit having previously performed at SXSW, Primavera Sound and Glastonbury festivals. Ever the internationalist, he tours with pickup bands sourced from each territory he plays in: a Barcelona band for Spain, a Berlin band for Germany and so forth. This cross-cultural exchange is another echo of the 1970s when world travelling soul and pop artists from the US did the same and guarantees that his live shows remain fresh, exciting and absolutely contemporary.

Indie/emo ensemble Lakes are set to release their new album Slow Fade, their fourth since

their inception in 2018. Widely known for their self-coined ‘glock-rock’ sound and mainstays of

Watford’s DIY scene and beyond, the six piece have explored a wealth of sonic shifts: from

midwest emo inspired by their heroes American Football to math-rock time signatures and

post-rock guitar melodies teeming with dark and vulnerable undertones. Now the band are

finding contentment within themselves by shifting the narrative to characters unknown using an

array of vivid yet nostalgic lyricism.

As part of their Red Water Lily tour Indie Rock band Leonian Dream will be co headlining the Dead Wax in Birmingham alongside a local Alternative Rock band which will be announced later to date.
Expect an evening full of energy! 

At the end of 2024 Bleach Lab shared ‘Drown’, the first single from their upcoming fourth EP ‘Close to the Flame’ (due July 2025). The EP will be the first body of work the band have shared since their critically and commercially acclaimed debut album ‘Lost In A Rush Of Emptiness’ which DIY called “A debut of dreamy loveliness” and went on to receive 5* and 4* reviews across the board. 

‘Close To The Flame’ is Bleach Lab’s first self-produced project. The EP explores the hardships of love from the band's personal experiences, capturing the messy reality of trying to hold onto love, whilst dealing with self-doubt, regret and the fear of losing yourself in the process. 

Further elevating their reputation with their dynamic live shows - which have included a headline show at London’s Scala and international festivals across the US and Europe - Bleach Lab are gearing up for another UK tour this November, which concludes with a London headline show at Bush Hall.

Neon Dreams is a Canadian alt-pop duo consisting of vocalist Frank Kadillac and drummer Adrian Morris. They write and produce their own music with long-time collaborator Corey Lerue. They defy genre pigeonholing, as they draw freely upon pop, rock, folk, EDM, hip-hop and reggae elements

Bio: Humour live together in Glasgow. They formed across the 2021 lockdowns, writing and recording their material at home, with the music intended as a backdrop to Andreas' lyrics. Sometimes they’re about letting people down, sometimes they’re about pets dying, sometimes they’re about trying to say something when you don’t have anything worth saying.

Signing to SoYoung Records off the back of a few rough demos, it was clear Humour had a unique sound. Their first release ‘Yeah, Mud!’ gained critical acclaim from NME, Clash Magazine, DIY, Dork and more. Following multiple plays on Radio 1, BBC Radio 6, and BBC Scotland, the band eventually released their debut EP, ‘Pure Misery’, which quickly established Humour as one of the most exciting acts in the country. They were featured in NME’S 100, BBC Scotland’s Top 25 for 2023, and three tracks from Pure Misery featured in The Herald’s Top 100 Tunes from Scotland in 2022.

The band immediately began to tour extensively off the back of the Pure Misery EP, supporting Do Nothing, Folly Group, Egyptian Blue, and Enumclaw at gigs and festivals across the UK, France, Luxembourg and the Netherlands. The band were then invited across the Atlantic to showcase at SXSW, where they packed out venues across Austin, TX. They followed this up with a debut UK headline tour, including shows in Brighton, London, Margate, Leeds, and Newcastle. Summer 2023 saw the band perform at Leopalooza, Truck Festival, 110 Above and Connect festivals in the UK, as well as a trip to Belgium for Leffingeleuren festival and a support show with Geese at Botanique in Brussels. An autumn tour supporting DoNothing followed, taking the band to new cities and venues across the UK and Europe.

The band released second EP 'A Small Crowd Gathered to Watch Me' at the end of 2023, exploring new sonic territories, again to critical acclaim. The songs have received extensive airplay on Radio 1, BBC Radio 6 and BBC Radio Scotland, as well as being featured in Spotify’s All New Punk, Melomania, Hot New Bands, All New Rock and more. Following this, Steve Lamacq selected Humour as the spotlight artist on his New Music Fix show on BBC 6 Music.

The band have since been holed up in the studio with Rod Jones of Idlewild, recording some new music - details of which will be announced soon…

Please note: The event information above has been added by the organiser. Whilst we try to ensure all details are up-to-date we do not make any warranty or representation as to the accuracy or completeness of the information shown.