Summer is winding down, and there are just a handful of excellent festivals left in the Northern Hemisphere. Reading and Leeds is the final big one in the UK and takes place this weekend. So if you want to travel the UK from north to south, you better have your tickets ready.
The 1975, Billie Eilish, the Killers, and Knucks are among the featured artists at both venues, so just be sure to check which days the artists are where. The festival runs from Friday, August 25th through Sunday, August 27th. There are a bunch of established artists playing, but the up-and-coming ones could be among the most exciting, right?
So who are three musical artists you should be watching for? And when and where will they play? Maybe the following three.
Three new musical artists to watch for at the Reading and Leeds Festival
Pinkshift
If you like your pop-punk with a slightly heavier pinch of punk then Pinkshift is for you. They will remind you of My Chemical Romance if you had a female singer (Ashrita Kumar) instead of Gerard Way. There is nothing wrong with that, and that is meant as no offense to Mr. Way.
Pinkshift are a bunch of would-be doctors (not a joke) who met while studying at John Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland in 2019. Sounds burning, right? It is anything but. You can catch the band in Reading on Friday evening and Leeds on Saturday evening.
Royel Otis
Two best friends from Sydney, Australia decide to get together and strum a guitar and churn out some tunes. Doesn't sound like your thing? Oh, just wait.
While there is definitely a poppier sound to the production, the duo also sounds a bit like old-school Modest Mouse mixed up with Death Cab for Cutie. Indie-pop rarely sounded so good. You can - and should - catch Royel Otis at Leeds on Friday in the early afternoon, and Reading on Sunday afternoon.
Joey Valence & Brae
So you're a huge fan of the Beastie Boys, are you? You miss the way they were when they were young, you say? You love those bombastic beats with lyrics that attack you with the aggression of punk? Well, you are in for a treat.
Joey Valence & Brae already have a decent following, as they should. They sound almost retro, but their energy is electric. You should find them at Reading on Saturday evening, and in Leeds on Sunday evening.