The Great Escape At a Glance:
What: The Great Escape (TGE) is a festival dedicated to showcasing emerging artists from across the globe. The Great Escape also contains a conference for music industry folks to attend panels and presentations.
When: May 14 to 17, 2025 (May 13 to 16 2026)
Price: One day tickets available for £65. Passes for Wed to Sat for £108. (Super early bird passes for next year available now for £80)
Who: 550 emerging artists from across the globe
Where: Brighton!
What I Liked:
Spoiled for Choice: With over 550 acts across 30 venues, Brighton becomes a city thrumming with possibility. And having a festival wristband feels like a special pass to a secret underground world of music. Banners for the festival coat the city and you will often stumble upon a new venue that you didn’t even know was part of the festival. Trying to find new music today is controlled by algorithms. But The Great Escape lets you find new music just by walking and following your ears.
Emerging Artists: The Great Escape promises discovery. The thrill of waiting for a show to start, hoping you might find a new favorite artist is intoxicating. Additionally, supporting up and comers feels like you are a part of the selection process for the music industry. This helps provide a sense that your individual presence and attention matters. You’re not just another face in the crowd.
Intimate Venues: Smaller venues get you up close and personal to the music and artists. In these smaller venues audiences get a peek behind the curtain. Getting there 15 minutes early and watching soundcheck is an interesting glimpse into how the sausage gets made. And because these venues are so small, there is a sense of connectedness to others in the space and the artists themselves. As artists walk through crowds to get on stage and set up their equipment, the music making process feels personal and human.
Beach Venues: Some venues are right on the beach, and with such amazing weather I found myself making decisions for which show to see based on venue. Special shout out to Horatio’s, Daltons, and all the Beach venues for being exactly what I was looking for from a festival in Brighton. Make sure to catch an evening at Horatio’s. There is no better feeling than listening to live music in a swanky bar on the pier. The patio opens up onto the seafront and you can see the entire city unfold as the daylight fades.
The Setting: Brighton is a vibrant and thriving city in its own right. The Great Escape festival is just one of many things going on at this time. If the festival ever gets too much you can always grab some fish and chips and take a nap on the beach. Sometimes taking some time to recuperate is necessary to stay energized for a full-on day of shows.
Inspiring: with so much new music I found my brain twisting in new and exciting ways. Musical and lyrical ideas that ambushed my humanity brought ideas of my own to the surface. Rifka’s “Mother Cradle Me” brought me to a place of open, unabated longing. A place that reignited an idea I’d been toying with for a while.
The App: With so many acts and venues it’s easy to get overwhelmed. However, the official TGE app has all the info you need for showtimes, and even lets you listen to a song from the artists right from within the app. The app lets you add events to your favorites to curate a list of shows you want to see. This makes staying organized and seeing acts you’re interested in so much easier.
Read more: Alternative Great Escape Stage: Thursday Review
The Great Escape: My Standout Artists
Jerub – A pop act with clever and affecting lyrics, Jerub’s radiant voice combines velvet comfort with a rawness that adds intrigue and emotion. His music is beautiful and rousing, and he sounds incredible live. His performance of Paint Me in Gold had me locked into every note that dripped from his tongue.
Just For Fun – Guilt-free pleasure. Just For Fun lives up to their name and provides an atmosphere for audiences to let their hair down and just be silly. Lyrics for songs like “always on top” and “boys” keep you listening for clever jokes while jamming to bouncy pop. Handing out branded condoms after the show is perhaps the most brilliant marketing/branding I’ve ever seen.
Welly’s live performance energy is in a league of its own. They feel like a group of Brits abroad that went to art school and developed really fun personalities. Just a band of school mates goofing off and making jokes. Helmed by Elliot Hall’s monumental stage presence, Welly gives a show that is guaranteed to bring a smile to your face.
Mandrake Handshake’s sound broke free from the UK indie/psychedelic mold. This 9-piece ensemble tickles the ear, with a sound you have to hear to understand. I couldn’t look away from lead singer Trinity Oksana’s flowing performance and dancing. She becomes a physical manifestation for their music that enraptures you.
Jasmine Thompson’s intimate performance at the Manchester Arts Club was an absolute treat. Her vocals are clean and coated with bittersweet honey. Special shout out to her guitarist / one man band Joe who was doing a million things at once. Playing the guitar, using a loop pedal and electric stomp, messing with a keyboard/synthesizer, and adjusting the mixing levels during soundcheck so that Jasmine’s vocals could cut through the mix.
What I Didn’t Like:
The Sound Mixing: If you were to go through my list of acts seen you would see that there were a handful of indie, rock, and punk bands. Unfortunately, the sound mixing for pretty much anything of this genre squashed the vocal to the point where they all started to blend together. By Saturday I was avoiding anything labelled rock or indie because I’d seen so many shows that felt indistinguishable because the vocal was lost in the muddy mix. The bass was so absurdly boosted that most songs in this genre might as well have been drum and bass. And with the guitar wailing on the mid and higher frequencies it all blends together to be this big attack of tonal static.
I’ve personally always connected to music most through the voice, so I hyper privilege vocals. Vocals are the most unique, distinguishing feature for a song. And a gifted vocalist transforms an act from forgettable to deeply moving. Sharing in that gift is part of what makes music so transcendental. Unfortunately, bass boosted stadium show audio in tight spaces does not carry the tonal complexity to communicate any feeling besides “stomp and clap”. Lyrical intelligibility was rare. And for a festival that’s about new music I think it’s pretty important that people can listen to the songwriting. If you are a band looking to attend The Great Escape it is definitely worth having a good relationship with the sound tech.
Very Still Crowds: A few artists mentioned how “still” the crowds were at this festival. And this was definitely something I noticed as well. Even when I went to the more dance focused acts, crowds were standing still, maybe tapping a foot along. If you are going to music festivals to let loose and dance your heart out, you’ll need to bring your own dance partners.
“Work” For Some: This might be because I was a reviewer; but with so many industry people around, you overhear lots of conversations about musicians battling through the industry. Which is kinda interesting, but also adds a layer of instrumentality to the whole festival. What makes festivals so marvelous is that feeling like you can forget about everything and just fully live in the present. Listening to music, walking around, following your ears, nose, and heart. Being surrounded by industry people who are looking for business opportunities instead of musical experiences denigrates that festival feeling a little.
Queuing: Sometimes a venue would be at capacity and you would miss out on seeing an act you were excited about. If you really care about seeing a particular artist make sure to get there 10-15 minutes early!
Walking through Cars and Construction: If you want to explore everything the festival has to offer, you’re going to be doing a lot of walking. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but unfortunately the rotary in front of the pier (a central location you will need to cross often) is a high traffic area for cars and the streets are frustrating to cross. Combine this with ongoing construction in the area which made some footpaths unusable, and getting around could be a tad frustrating.
Ear Fatigue: After over 40 shows in 4 days, I reached a point where I was kind of sick of music. And I LOVE music. But after nonstop exposure to sound systems that blend together, I didn’t want to listen to anything so… crafted. I just wanted to listen to the sea. And the rocks crunching beneath my feet. And people’s voices, just talking.
My need to hear as much music as possible had overwhelmed me. But the sea and the city made an organic soundscape. For the first time in a long time, I wasn’t reaching for my headphones walking from place to place. I was delighted to just lie on the rocks and simply be. The Great Escape gave me a new appreciation for the sounds of the Earth. And as I listened to the Earth, I started to hear something made by my brain, body, and the world around me—music of my own.
