Seven Splendour Sideshows You Can Still Buy Tickets For

Last time James Blake jetted our way, in 2013, he won our hearts — and eyes and ears. Two Sydney Opera House shows sold out before you could say Overgrown and the folks at Tone Deaf got so excited, they awarded him best International Tour of the Year, over Bruce Springsteen.

Now, he’s back with a third, full-length album, The Colour In Anything, released unexpectedly (to fans, at least) on May 6. Lasting 76 minutes, it sees Blake go more collaborative than ever before, with Frank Ocean and Justin Vernon making frequent appearances, and Rick Rubin taking care of production. “I wanted to open up and be more outgoing,” he told The Guardian. “The record became a commentary on my life rather than me becoming part of the rest of the world.”

At long last, Band of Horses, the gentle, bearded rockers from South Carolina, have dropped their fifth album, Why Are You OK?. Staying true to form, even the meaner songs sound a bit like Neil Young if he hadn’t discovered anger.

Now, as part of this year’s Splendour sideshows, the denim-clad daydreamers are descending on the Opera House. Billed as a “transformative display of pure guitar-driven anthems”, the Concert Hall seems an ideal location for the band to let loose their hazy, swirling, laidback ballads. For those overdue for a ‘Casual Party’, book. Book now.

And just like that, The Cure are 40. What’s more surprising is that they haven’t been to Australia since 2007. This year, Robert Smith and the gang are back on tour and reports coming out of the US are that the performances are not only as far off the wall as it’s possible to get, but that they’re also thoroughly fantastic.

Sure the hits are there, but it’s the emergence of rarer gems that have fans excited. As well as a smattering of new material, the band have mined their back catalogue, blowing the dust off songs like ‘Screw’, ‘The Exploding Boy’ and ‘Bloodflowers’, that haven’t been performed live in a couple of decades.

If you’re just hanging out for ‘Friday I’m in Love’ or ‘Let’s Go to Bed’, you’re not going to be denied. But with a two-hour run-time and no aversion to encores, The Cure’s Splendour sideshow also promises a glimpse of lesser-known wonders.

When Jake Bugg‘s self-titled debut album hit the UK charts at #1, he was just 18. Fast forward three years and it looks like only a ‘Lightning Bolt’ would stop him. He’s released another two full-lengths, the latest being On My One, which came out on June 17. Combining blues, folk, country and surprising dash of hip hop, its preoccupation, Bugg told iHeart Radio is loneliness. Naw.

“Some of the songs, they are personal, and some of them, whenever I want to get away from personal things, I write stories to try and put myself somewhere else,” he said. The last time we Aussies saw him was in 2015, when he supported Mumford and Sons in their wildly popular Gentlemen Of the Road tour.

As far as Australian love goes, 2016 has been an epic year for English alt rockers The 1975. They kicked off with an Australian tour in January, which sold out within minutes, while their second LP, I Like It When You Sleep For You Are So Beautiful Yet So Unaware Of It, smashed the charts, debuting at #1 on the ARIA and iTunes charts.

Combining ’80s sounds with a contemporary aesthetic, the album spawned hits ‘Girls’, ‘The Sound’ and ‘Love Me’. Next up came sets at Coachella and Glastonbury, and a stack of other festivals are now lined up — from Chicago’s Lollapalooza to Japan’s Summer S

No prizes for guessing where Peter, Bjorn and John are travelling from. The Swedish trio’s main claim to fame is the creation of the catchiest whistling tune ever created, ‘Young Folks‘. More recently, they took a little break, during which they built a studio, founded a record label and wrote a bunch more cracking pop songs.

April 2015 marked their triumphant return, with the release of single ‘High Up (Take Me To The Top)’ and, in June 2016, the launch of seventh LP Breakin’ Point. Rolling Stone‘s James Jennings called it “their glossiest, poppiest album yet,” without an ounce of negativity, adding that “the group have crafted a consistently enjoyable album that casually tosses off killer choruses like it’s no big thing.”

Alt-rockers Beach Slang and Spring King are travelling our way from either side of the Atlantic for this punk-rock, post-punk, double bill, Splendour sideshow

Beach Slang, who hail from Philadelphia, smashed through ten high-powered shows at this year’s SXSW, off the back of launching full-length album The Things We Do to Find People Who Feel Like Us. This will be their Australian debut, so let’s show ’em a good time. Meanwhile, Spring King, from Manchester, caught the attention of Zane Lowe with 2014 single ‘City’. Their debut album, Tell Me If You Like To, came out in June.