Outer Waves Festival 2025
Johnny James, Managing Editor
A new festival is born as Outer Waves takes over Invisible Wind Factory and Make Liverpool over two days this May.
Liverpool isn’t short of festivals, but there aren’t many doing what Outer Waves is doing – offering an inclusive space for all things experimental and underground. Blending live music, visual arts, interactive performances and educational initiatives, Outer Waves will celebrate Liverpool’s grassroots creative communities while also attracting international artists that tie in with the vision. We’re sold already.
But then there’s the line-up. The first headliner is Gong – one of the most boundary-pushing rock groups of the seventies, twisting jazz and psychedelia with elements of mysticism and surrealism. Joining them as headliners are Liverpool’s experimental percussion ensemble Ex-Easter Island Head, who’ve spent the last 15 years making some of the boldest (yet quietest) experiments in British music, eschewing digital effects in favour of physical modification and guitar preparation.
Mandy, Indiana are another – very different – highlight. Mixing coarse industrialism, squalling feedback and contorted electronics, their 2023 debut album i’ve seen a way blew up in a way that few noise records do. Landing a Best New Music tag from Pitchfork, the band found themselves winning fans in everyone from Daniel Avery to Gilla Band, and swapping basement shows in Manchester for clubs in New York and LA.
Experimental music fans won’t want to miss Abstract Concrete, featuring the UK underground heavyweight Charles Hayward (of the legendary This Heat and Camberwell Now), while Aja Ireland brings something more contemporary and electronic. Unsettling noise, experimental techno and deconstructed club combine in her live sets, described in The Wire Magazine as “shifting from ethereal diffusions to potent explosions”.
From Manchester, Hyperdawn have honed their own hands-on approach to music making, using live reel-to-reel tape processing, electronics and vocals across vast off-kilter beats and melting r’n’b croons. Two more highlights, both hailing from Liverpool: Those Holy, an electronic duo standing at the intersection of industrial noise and gothic pop, and Coughin Vicars, a DIY punk band referencing first generation English post punk with early 80s LA Death rock – and a bit of Merseyside grit.
With many more names on the bill, performing on multiple stages, the line-up packs a real punch – especially considering the very reasonable price tag. And the festival is just the beginning. Beyond the two-day event, Outer Waves “will continue to foster artistic growth through year-round programming, artist commissions, and local partnerships”.
Great festivals often come and go without really making an effort to connect with and support the local communities that they purport to serve. By the sounds of it Outer Waves is doing it differently, and that’s great to see.
