We’re well into festival season now, with weekenders across the UK and Europe coming thick and fast. The behemoth that is Glastonbury kicked off the season proper at the end of June,  but if you weren’t lucky enough to snag golden tickets to Worthy Farm, there are still plenty of festivals that you can get stuck into this summer. With Reading and Leeds just a month away (featuring a stacked lineup which includes Lana Del Rey, Liam Gallagher, Blink 182 and The Prodigy), as well as some excellent boutique and family festivals on the cards (Deershed and Lindisfarne Festival are amongst our favourites here at SO.CO). The great thing is that passes for loads of them can be had for less than the price of a ticket to see Billie Eilish at the O2 next year.

Talking of ticket prices - I’m going to stick my neck out and suggest that £400 is too expensive for a gig ticket. I know, crazy! It seems that I’m not the only one though, with ticket sales for Ms Eilish’s UK shows in 2025 reportedly being much slower than expected. In the wake of rapidly declining CD sales, it feels like artists and promoters are attempting to make up the shortfall by gouging on gig tickets. Whilst I can thoroughly recommend the Billie Eilish live experience (based on what I saw at Leeds Festival last year) I can’t for a second encourage anyone to support such exploitative pricing, and I can only hope the slow sales on this tour encourage promoters to think again about what the pockets of even the most dedicated fans will tolerate. 

I had the terrible idea of giving Eminem’s new album, The Death Of Slim Shady, a spin this week. It’s quite frankly amazing that an artist that once had so many sparks of genius has resorted to becoming a tribute act to his former self. The Marshall Mathers LP is one of my favourite albums, and I had high hopes for the new record. Sadly, it’s a pastiche, and not even a very good one.  Thankfully there’s some great new music hitting your streaming service of choice right now, and here’s a few of our favourite brand new cuts:

Tour Announcements: 

Autumn tour announcements are coming thick and fast, with SO.CO faves Millie Manders and The Shutup following up a busy summer festival schedule with a thirteen date headline tour in celebration of their upcoming album Wake Up, Shut Up, Work. The tour starts in Brighton on October 24th and ends up in Norwich on November 16th. All the details can be found here. 

LA melodic punks Militarie Gun have also announced a handful of UK club shows on the back of their Reading and Leeds appearances. The band will be taking in Cardiff, Southampton and Cambridge, before finishing up at End Of The Road Festival. Details here. 

Finally, the always superb cumgirl8 (NSFW) are heading out on a HUGE two month tour of the UK and Europe, starting in August. They’re almost certainly playing somewhere near you, and you definitely should go. Tickets can be had here. 

Have a great weekend! 

Tom

Header Image: CMAT by Neil Lupin