NEWS
ØYA Festival has confirmed another wave of acts for its already packed 2026 programme, with Lily Allen, TOMORA and Band Of Horses all joining the bill.
The Norwegian event will return to Tøyen Park in Oslo from Wednesday August 12 through to Saturday August 15. Back in October, The Cure were unveiled as the first headline act, while Amyl And The Sniffers were also named among the early additions.
Shortly after, it emerged that Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds would be sharing top billing with The Cure, headlining the festival as part of their European tour plans for 2026.
Further announcements followed in November, when organisers revealed CMAT, Sombr, Underworld and Lambrini Girls. The following month brought another influx of names, including Geese, Blood Orange, Mogwai and several more artists.
As 2026 gets underway, the festival team have now shared another major update to the bill. Lily Allen is among the latest confirmations and will appear on Saturday August 15, where she is set to perform her 2025 record West End Girl from start to finish. The news arrives as the singer prepares for a busy year of festival appearances and headline shows, marking a full scale return following the widely praised album.
Band Of Horses are also set to make their way back to the festival on Friday August 14. Their first ever European festival performance took place at the same site in 2006, and nearly twenty years later they will mark the occasion by playing their debut album Everything All The Time in full.
Also newly added to the bill is TOMORA, the high energy collaboration between Tom Rowlands of The Chemical Brothers and Norwegian pop artist AURORA. The project had already drawn attention after announcing a series of live dates before being formally introduced. Last month, the duo released their first single Ring The Alarm.
Elsewhere in today’s announcement on Thursday January 29 are Marit Larsen, formerly part of global pop duo M2M, along with Norwegian singer songwriter Thomas Dybdahl, stoner rock outfit Slomosa, emerging artist Hannah Storm, Beth McBride which is the solo project of Bethany Forseth Reichberg, Norwegian folk collective Reolô and electronic group Nonne.
Tickets for the festival are available now, with further details and purchasing options accessible online.
Last year’s edition of ØYA Festival featured headline performances from Chappell Roan, Charli XCX, Queens Of The Stone Age and Girl In Red. The wider bill also included Fontaines D.C., Kneecap, Wet Leg, Beth Gibbons, Lola Young, Heartworms, Kelly Lee Owens and Khruangbin.
Speaking with NME during the event, festival director Claes Olsen discussed how the team tracks emerging artists who could eventually grow into headline performers. “I like to see bands develop naturally over time,” he said. “There are a few smaller acts right now that I think are genuinely special. People always ask who the next big thing is, but you can never really predict it. When we first started talks with Charli XCX and Chappell Roan last April, headline slots were not even part of the conversation. Things just kept building from there.”
NEWS
Brad Paisley has called Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce’s wedding “one of the least pretentious weddings he’s ever seen”.
The country star attended the ceremony alongside his actress wife, Kimberly Williams-Paisley. They joined around 1,000 guests at New York City’s Madison Square Garden earlier this month as the global pop icon married the American football star.
Although the celebration attracted enormous attention and involved tight security and a stunning makeover of the famous arena, Paisley said the occasion never came across as excessive.
“Ironically, (it) was one of the least pretentious weddings that I've ever seen or ever will see,” Paisley told The Associated Press during an interview. “It meant a lot to be (invited). It was, kind of, a big thank you from her to invite us.”
Paisley, who chose Swift as an opening performer for his tour when she was a teenager in 2007, said he was delighted to be included in what many considered the biggest celebrity wedding of the year.
“They were very clear with the invite, and I took this personally when I got the invite, because in the invite, it said, ‘If you're getting this, you mean a lot to us,’” he revealed.
The musician also explained that guests were not told the wedding’s exact location until the date drew nearer.
“It was really fun to watch the cat and mouse game of, like, ‘We can tell you roughly where it's going to be, we're not gonna say what building... and here's the date. If you're in, we'll tell you more,’” he continued. “I went to my wife, I said, ‘Want to go?’ and she said, ‘Absolutely, we gotta be there!’ So, we did it, it was RSVP yes.”
Other famous attendees included Brad Pitt, Gigi Hadid, Bradley Cooper, Ed Sheeran, Sabrina Carpenter, Hugh Grant, Haim and Tom Hanks.
