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Jun 05, 2025 By Nick Roseblade Photography by Nick Roseblade Web Exclusive

Silly season is in effect in Brighton again. May is the busiest month of the year. Much more so than December. In May Brighton hosts the annual arts Festival and its sister festival The Fringe. For a month the city is filled with performers, actors, artists, pop up venues and food vendors. It is also Open House. Where artists open their front doors and invite the general public in for a nose around, under the promise they’ll buy some art, at best, or some tea and cake at the least. If this wasn’t enough, it’s also The Great Escape. The annual music conference that gets bigger and bigger each year. It is impossible to see every band playing on the official bill. Then factor in the Alt Escape, Fake Escape, Alt-Alt Escape and a half-a-dozen other unofficial programmes running at the same time, it’s impossible to see more than a couple of dozen bands a day.

Like last year I decided to avoid the official shows and focus on the unofficial ones. The reason being these shows are free, and you’ll have a greater chance of seeing something incredible that you didn’t know before. Last year I saw Ebbb as I liked what I heard when passing a pub. They went on to release my favourite EP of the year. This year I decided to go out twice. On the Thursday and the Saturday. Thursday, I wanted to stay in one place, as I liked all the bands on the bill, and Saturday I would jump around a bit.

THURSDAY MAY 15

My Precious Bunny, Lichen, Cubzoa and Luxury @ The Folklore Room, Brighton.

The bands I wanted to see at The Folklore Room went on at 10pm, so I went out at 9pm to get down there in time. It felt weird going out so late. Normally I’m already out at this time if I’m going to a gig. I tried to remember the last time it had happened. As I couldn’t, I reasoned it either never had, or it was over a decade ago. As I walked in Luxury were just finishing off their set. These three pieces had a great energy, awesome singer and their final song was a proper banger. I’d like to see this lot again. And soon!

Up next was Cubzoa. Last year I Cubzoa play in St. Nicholas’ church. That show had visuals, keyboard/synths, woodwinds and other lavish motifs. This year everything was stripped down to guitar, vocals, bass and drums. Both sets were impressive, but I couldn’t work out which I liked more. Jack Wolter, from Penelope Isles, has crafted some glorious songs. Obvs… But the songs tonight had a slightly gritter feel to them. There was an immediacy to the performance. It felt like Wolter HAD to sing these songs or he wouldn’t be able to function. The debut Cubzoa album is out on Bella Union later in the year. After this set I’m VERY excited to hear that album.

Up next was Lichen. This six piece features songwriter Michael Clark, Allister Kellaway and Lily Wolter. Lily was putting in a proper shift tonight as she was in Cubzoa, Lichen and she was also headlining the night. More on that later. Lichen sounds like what Black Country; New Road should be doing. Their music is catchy, intricately played, the lyrics are thoughtful and slightly humorous without being funny or annoying. It’s all great stuff. The highlight was when the fiddle player started strumming her fiddle like a guitar and then slung it back on her shoulder and delivered some incendiary playing. At one point Jack Wolter joined the band on shakers. These Wolters never stop!

The final band of the night was My Precious Bunny. Here, Lily took centre stage. Joined by her brother Jack, Allister Kellaway, Kamran Kaur and other members of her inner circle. The music wasn’t what I expected. To be fair I wasn’t sure WHAT I was expecting but this wasn’t it. The killer melodies, and filagree vocals, were there but the music flitted from classic introverted bedroom indie to really expansive rockers. It was flawless. The only problem was it was over too soon. Rumour has it that the debut My Precious Bunny album is out next year on Bella. Like the Cubzoa album, I am VERY excited to see more live shows and hear those songs in full!

SATURDAY MAY 17

On the Saturday afternoon I was joined by my seven-year-old daughter. This was such a delight. She’s been saying for a while that she wants to see more live music, but there aren’t a lot of matinee shows in town. Last year we saw Cosmo Sheldrake as he played an afternoon set for this very reason. Despite our heading out at 2pm we couldn’t see all the bands we wanted as they were in 18+ venues. Luckily, we found a few venues that were cool with having a child present, so we had an enjoyable afternoon. We started with Amy Yon at St. Nicholas’ church. Yon’s music is classic singer songwriter. We only caught the last three songs, but we both enjoyed her set immensely. Her final song was the best. She put down her acoustic guitar and belted out an acapella version of “Nothing to It”. It was goosebumps level good!

After that we headed to the Folklore Room for Sam Tudor. I thought she’d be into the venue as the back of the stage has trees, grass and fairy lights everywhere. She was kind of into it, but it was dark and people were worried about being knocked over. We left after two songs. Tudor was a classic American singer songwriter. If I’d been on my own, I would have stayed a bit longer as it was nice, but we had other bands to see. This is the beauty of the Great Escape. You are under no obligation to stay longer than you wish. If you see a band and don’t feel it, you can bail there and then. I’ve walked out of better bands than I would normally pay for because I want to try and catch someone else. This was one of those occasions.

Next port of call was the Hope and Ruin. The Hope is one of my daughter’s favourite places to go in town. I think it’s because she knows it’s not a place where a lot of kids go, plus they have all kinds of random stuff hanging from the ceiling and the bar staff are always sweet to her. We managed to get a good spot at the end of the bar. Ordered some Pengest Poppers, some pints of pineapple juice and got ready for Adore. This Irish indie/punk trio ripped the roof off The Hope’s downstairs bar. The music was loud, fast, catchy and very good. My daughter was into it but enjoyed looking at some of the clientele more. As this was early on the last time, I had hoped a lot of the lanyard wankers would be nursing hangovers elsewhere, not downing Jager bombs at the bar. “Why is everyone drinking fizzy drinks?” she asked “Don’t they know they’ll have stomach aches later from it? I did after I had lemonade at that birthday party last year”.

After Adore we went to Molly Malone’s to see Hutch. Adore were great but a little bit too lairy for my daughter so I wanted to find something in between. Unfortunately, Molly’s was operating an 18+ door policy, so we only managed to see one song. It was great though. Hutch has that indie cool vibe down. The music is super fun, and their live performance was invigorating next to the serene nature of Amy Yon and Sam Tudor.

We decided to try St. Nicholas’ church again. This time the Fred Hills Trio were playing. This set was jazzier, but more like Portico Quartet jazz, than Sun Ra. We got a good seat and, after getting some water and snacks from the pop-up bar at the back, settled down to their set. Their playing was the finest we saw all day. The songs, though 100% instrumental, had really lyrical playing. My daughter really liked the double bassist. I don’t think she’d ever seen one before and couldn’t take her eyes off it.

After four songs we went back to The Hope. Jock was on the stage when we got there. We managed to get a good spot again. As we were watching Jock dismantle The Hope Colin Newman and Malka Spigel, from Immersion turned up. We chatted and I (re)introduced them to my daughter, as it had been a minute since they’d seen her. They were doing what we were. Just hopping from venue to venue checking out what they fancied. Jock’s best song was “Joe Duffy”. When they played this, it felt like everything went up a gear. It was one of the best songs of 2024 and one of my favourites by a new band. Through laptop speakers, and tinny headphones, it sounds awesome. Played live through big PA speakers it sounds like £1,000,000. Jock deserves to be getting vertigo from being so high on festival billings this summer!

After Jock we decided to head back to St. Nicholas’ again to calm it down before we headed home. Ebony Grace was just about to start when we took our seats near the front. Her set was piano lead, singer songwriter. Think Fiona Apple. Think Tori Amos. Ebony Grace didn’t sound like either of these but there were motifs throughout that reminded me to play “Under the Pink” and “Tidal” when I got in. After a couple of songs Grace was joined by another double bassist, my daughter’s face lit up when he took the stage, a drummer and another singer. When Grace was joined by this band the music was elevated to something greater than its parts. While the songs worked better with a band it was good to see a more stripped-down performance to begin with.

When Ebony Grace finished her set, we left and got the bus home. After watching the “Joe Duffy” video a couple of times I asked if she’d had a good time. The answer was “Yes” then she said, “Can I come next year?”. It was then my time to say yes. I asked if she’d liked any of the acts and who they were “The first girl Amy Yon” she said “She had the best voice” this was true. “Who else did you like?” I asked, “The last girl because her drummer was really loud”. You know what, if she keeps these reviews coming, I might be in trouble… The Great Escape is a great weekend in town. It brings a lot of people who you might not see together and, if you are lucky, you might see your new favourite band. There is a lot wrong with it, but I won’t get into that now but making a seven-year-old want to see more live music kind of makes all the fuss, faff, overcrowding of town worthwhile.