YARD ACT – FOLLY GROUP – MURKAGE DAVE
YARD ACT
“Nervous riffs, unstoppable groove, inspired lyrics”.
Les Inrocks
“As worthy heirs to the old witnesses to the ruin of the North of England, the quartet from Leeds have come up with a first album of post-punk that is catchy, demanding and funny”, is how Les Inrocks described the band.
Hailing from Leeds and made up of James Smith (vocals, lyrics), Sam Shipstone (guitar), Ryan Needham (bass) and Jay Russell (drums), Yard Act released their debut album, ‘The Overload’, in 2022, to commercial and critical success. It peaked at number two in the UK charts, was acclaimed by the specialist press and won the band the Brit Award for Newcomer of the Year in 2023. Fans of Sleaford Mods, IDLES and Franz Ferdinand, this concert is for you.
FOLLY GROUP
On stage, Folly Group consists of drums, bass, guitar, vocals and a sequencer. As well as a live performance, the collective aims to be a protean creative entity, bringing together friends whose practice extends to a variety of artistic fields. Folly Group is a playground for formal experimentation, questioning the very notion of musical formation.
MURKAGE DAVE
Murkage Dave is a true urban poet, hailing from Leytonstone and living in East London. Combining music and literature, the artist is making a name for himself with a disparate mix of influences that give rise to a resolutely British pop sound. Discovered thanks to ‘Murkage Changed My Life’ (2018), a marriage between r&b and pop, he is making a name for himself in the social labyrinth that is East London, despite the big names already there, such as Frank Ocean and Kevin Abstract.
Dark and gloomy, the English capital made the composer’s heart beat faster, and he released his album ‘This City Needs a Hero’ in 2022. A theatre of socio-political friction that allowed Murkage Dave to express his innermost thoughts on tracks like “Please Don’t Move To London It’s A Trap” and “World I Want To Live In”. His songwriting talents are particularly apparent in the featuring with Caroline Polachek, ‘Awful Things’, where shame and guilt form a meticulous emotional knitting already at work on many tracks.
With collaborations with the likes of Mike Skinner, Evidence, Skepta, Nekfeu, Tricky and many more, the original formula of his project has earned the artist the support of Pharrell Williams, Young Fathers, Iggy Pop as well as Pitchfork, The Guardian and Rolling Stone.
