This year was the 20th Birthday of Kendal Calling 2025. Each year that has passed has seen the event go from strength to strength and this year was no exception. A sell out crowd of over 45,000 attendees over the course of 4 days and guaranteed the vast majority went home with a big smile and the hope of returning next year. The weather gods smiled, departure day apart! Multiple stages ranging from the impressive Main Stage, set in its natural amphitheatre, giving probably the best views for thousands at any UK festival, the large Parklands and Coming Out, down to more intimate Woodlands and BBC Introducing/Roots stages and a few more in between.
So when it came to choosing which artists to go see, the once predominately indie festival now has something for just about everyone, spoilt for choice comes to mind, top headliners were The Courteeners, Fatboy Slim and The Prodigy, with Kaiser Chiefs on the Thursday night. If you add in the likes of The Last Dinner Party, Travis, The Wombats, Sophie Ellis Baxter you knew we were In for a good time. That’s not mentioning the other 100 plus artists performing.
As well as catching up with some personal favourites, for me half the fun of a festival is discovering new musical talent you have not come across before. Some finds for me this year include The Wednesday Flowers, a young all girl group, with a nice indie/grunge vibe, the emotive Talia Rae, atmospheric Robyn Errico, alt.pop from Isabel Maria and sultry voiced Lois, a quartet of talented singer songwriters destined for bigger things, the bands Long Island, High Fade, Dutch Criminal Record and They Say Jump. Add to this some more established artists I managed to catch up with included Nina Nesbitt, Nieve Ella, Siobhan Winifred, Chloe Slater, Lowes, Dub Pistols and the Lottery Winners. It was great to see even the artists on earlier in the day and on the smaller stages still brought in decent sized appreciative audiences and I personally didn’t come across one bad performance out of more than twenty I took in, the vast majority being top notch.
Whilst there can always be room for improvement, address the queues to get on site on the Thursday, the very long hikes from camping and parking and some acts needed a bigger stage are more logistical than anything else. The whole production, sound quality, lighting, amazing visuals and fireworks, the people, the vibe, the energy all come together to deliver one off the best Festival experiences you can have.
I was fortunate enough to be able to photograph the festival as well, so do check out some shots on the Music News Social Media sites.
Tickets go on sale for Kendal Calling 2026 on Thursday 7th August 2025, another sold out event would not surprise me.
MUSIC PREMIERES
Lykke Li didn’t hold back when speaking about the making of her sixth studio album, ‘The Afterparty’, during a listening session in Los Angeles earlier this year. “Let’s talk about the album. It was a motherfucker to make,” she admitted to the crowd. While balancing motherhood, the chaos of modern culture shaped by Trump and AI, and her own desire to create something more “extroverted, impulsive and chaotic” than ‘EYEYE’, as she previously shared with NME, the Swedish alt pop star arrived at a headspace that “feels like it’s 4am and the sun is going to rise”. The record captures that blurry final moment before regret, exhaustion and reality settle in, which makes it even more emotional considering she has hinted this could potentially be her final album.
There is something fitting about how brief the project feels. With only nine tracks running across 24 minutes, it never overstays its welcome. Lykke immediately drops listeners into the atmosphere with opener ‘Not Gon Cry’, painting a picture of those lonely early morning hours with the line, “No angels here tonight, no dancing queens.” Alongside the shadowy pulse of ‘Happy Now’ and the twisted disco energy of ‘Lucky Now’, she revisits the emotional yet dance driven spirit of her earlier material while blending in the sharper, more confident attitude heard on ‘So Sad, So Sexy’ and the shimmering influence of her 2019 Mark Ronson collaboration ‘Late Night Feelings’.
The emotional fallout begins to settle in quickly. ‘Famous Last Words’ carries a lush orchestral sadness as Lykke reflects on lessons that only came after years of chaos and late nights, confessing, “I had to crash and burn to tell the tale.” Then comes ‘Future Fear’, a delicate acoustic track with robotic textures that stares directly into anxiety and uncertainty with the chilling question, “I’m going to a dark place, do you need anything?” Meanwhile, ‘So Happy I Could Die’ glows like sunrise after a sleepless night, holding onto fleeting moments as she sings about “slipping through the hourglass”.
Throughout the album, Lykke Li vividly captures the beauty and wreckage of reckless nights with the vulnerability that has always defined her music. On ‘Sick Of Love’, she channels heartbreak into revenge, wanting to “make you beg for it” after rejection in a way that feels spiritually connected to Robyn’s ‘Dancing On My Own’. One of the strongest moments arrives with ‘Knife In The Heart’, a track that fully embraces her desire to become the “rock god” and “fuck boy” she spoke about, firing back at anyone who tries to tear her down with the words “you can spit, you can walk on me” while delivering one of the catchiest songs she has created in years.
Closing track ‘Euphoria’ leaves behind the same bittersweet feeling that runs through the rest of the album. With sweeping strings, pulsing beats and emotional intensity, Lykke Li reminds listeners that nothing lasts forever as she sings, “Player play your song, waste the night away”. Like the fading energy of the perfect night out, ‘The Afterparty’ ends in a haze of beauty and uncertainty. If this truly is her farewell, she leaves with one final intoxicating statement, though it still feels like there could be another chapter waiting.
