An early start to watch a particular football match taking place in Glasgow on TV was followed by day two of the Sound City festival where Umarells kicked off our day at the Kazimier Stockroom at 3.30pm. The Manchester band are led by vocalist and keyboard player Imogen Badrock, they released an EP Once More Day in November 2024 and it was a busy room for the half-hour set from which we really enjoyed One More Day and Closer. We had expected to see them an hour earlier but everything had been pushed back an hour and unfortunately She’s In Parties had to pull out of their slot due to vocalist Katie Dillon being ill, this was a real shame as we were looking forward to their set. Get well soon Katie!.
Alphabet were next up back at the Kazimier Stockroom, they may only have three songs released on the streaming services – Artificial Light, All The Words and Colour Fade – but they sounded like a band that have been around for years. They almost didn’t play as their drummer was in the USA but friend Andy stepped up to the hi-hats and saved the day for them! The best song was left to the last with Artificial Light, some of the guitar riffs on that particular track were memorable and just what the crowd needed to reawaken the music spirit from the previous day. 7/10
After a quick walk up to Grand Central Hall, we caught the last two tracks from Liverpool up-and-coming band Stanleys, we saw them at the YNot? Festival last year and really enjoyed their set, another band to keep an eye on. The Sunday afternoon headliners were local band STONE, who would create mayhem during a pulsating forty-five minute set that made sure everyone was awake at last. Fin Power and the band played a few of the well know songs alongside a few from last years debut album Fear Life For A Lifetime, an album we reviewed at Bring The Noise, this quartet really are the real deal with great explosive guitar riffs, bass and vocals making them sound very punk influenced especially during Leave It Out and Let’s Dance To The Real Thing. Fin Power and Elliot Gill were both on form today and soon had the crowd moshing, the movement from both these guys was mesmerising with Finn even coming down among the crowd to orchestrate the mosh pit. 9/10
Rising youngster Alex Spencer played at Sound City for the third year in a row, he was finishing his exams this time last year and has exploded on to the Manchester music scene and slowly building a fan base around the UK, where he has been touring a lot over the past year. There is a large crowd in at The Arts Club Loft to catch his set and he look absolutely delighted to be back in Liverpool, grinning from ear to ear throughout the performance. We get to hear his latest release Bucket List that is lapped up by the young knowledgeable crowd as well as his more established tracks Nightmares, One Way Ticket and Waiting For The Change. It has been great to see Spencer develop as a musician over the past three years at Sound City, this lad has a bright future. 8/10
We rushed back up to Grand Central for Falkirk band Brogeal, this being their Sound City debut we didn’t want to miss the set, they are a mixture of folk and rock music with this combination proving very infectious for the crowd, some of whom even made some attempts at traditional Scottish dancing, something that we are still trying to forget about from school all those years ago! We have been lucky enough to see Brogeal perform live a few times and they just get better and better, new song Friday On My Mind, You’ll Be Mine and Man Accused Of Murder were the standout tracks for us. 8/10
This year was a pretty poor showing for the Scottish bands with only Brogeal and Sunday night headliner Dylan John Thomas representing the nation, can we give Sound City some recommendations for next year? Ok lets go for just five: Bottle Rockets, Her Picture, Dictator, The Painting and Fright Years are bands that immediately spring to mind that deserve the opportunity to showcase their music to a wider audience. TTSSFU had just began their set when we arrived back at The Arts Club Loft, it is always a pleasure to see this band live, they have made so much progress since we saw them at Edinburgh Psych Fest and Tenement Trail last year, Tasmin Nicole Stephens leads the band through a half-hour of shoegaze/indie rock that certainly caught the crowds attention, the guitarist was his usual self showing off his skills on the fretboard. We really enjoyed Baggage, Studio 54 and final track of the set as always I Hope You Die before Tasmin screams and disappears from the stage. We would love to see TTSSFU play a headline set in the near future. 8/10
Personally the last three bands we saw were the absolute highlight of our weekend – Rosellas, IST IST and Dylan John Thomas are the bands in question – and we were so glad to see this trio of bands added to the Sound City list a while back. ECBGS hosted Manchester five-piece Rosellas who have freshly signed with First Run Records, based behind the famous Barrowland Ballroom so the only way is up for this talented rock band. They will release their first single with the new label Eyes Of The World on 23rd May and we were delighted to get an early listen to it tonight. We have been following these guys since we saw them live at Gullivers in Manchester back in 2021, the six-track set was filled with great vocals from Drew Selby backed up with some electrifying guitar work and keyboards, the band state that they take influences from bands such as The War On Drugs, The Verve and Pink Floyd and we can definitely hear snapshots of them in their music. Born Under A Cloud and Common Ground were the standouts from the half-hour set for us but we thoroughly enjoyed every song and look forward to seeing them live again. 9/10
We wanted to see Panic Shack play up at the Arts Club Loft but decided to head down to the basement instead for Manchester’s IST IST and we are so glad that we did as they played an extended set of eleven tracks with a little group of enthusiastic fans down the front having the time of their lives, ourselves included. Adam Houghton (vocals & guitar), Matt Peters (guitar & synth), Andy Keating (bass) and Joel Kay (drums) ran through a set taken from their back catalogue of four albums – Architecture, The Art Of Lying, Protagonists and Light A Bigger Fire – the set opens with Stamp You Out, the bass is pumping through my chest already as they get a great response from the crowd with Lost My Shadow, Something Has To Give, You’re Mine and Emily being the pick of the bunch for us. 9/10
Due to IST IST overrunning we dashed back up to Grand Central for the final act of a lively weekend, Dylan John Thomas and it turns out we only missed four songs – Jenna, When I Get Home, Rich Boy and Wake Up Ma – with another twelve still to come the atmosphere downstairs was great to see, Grand Central was definitely the place to be this weekend. Champs-Elysees went down a treat while the cover of classic ABBA track Mamma Mia gave those that didn’t know Dylan’s music a chance to join in, and that they did. The young Glaswegian always has a calm head no matter the mayhem going on around him as Up In The Air creates the usual craziness among the crowd, an unreleased track Got You On My Mind was good to hear live and should be his next release. The two songs in the encore are among his best as Nobody Else and Fever brings the set to an end and also the end of Sound City 2025. Looking forward to next year already! 10/10
