PVA and The Orchestra (For Now) among latest additions to The Great Escape 2026.

By Hard of Hearing on April 9, 2026

The tastemaking Brighton festival adds over 100 new names to its jam-packed bill.

Bishopskin at The Great Escape 2025 by Hazel Blacher | Words: Lloyd Bolton

With festival season slowly kicking into gear, it’s about time to get out the highlighters, spreadsheets, dowsing rods, or whatever it is that will help you start plotting a course through the behemoth that is The Great Escape. The UK’s definitive conference of new music, heavily skewed to representing new and cutting-edge artists across genres, is set for another big year as it returns to take over Brighton from 13^th to 16^th May.

Adding to a bill that already boasts Hard of Hearing favourites such as casual smart, 1000 Rabbits, SLAG, Little Grandad, big long sun and Natalie Wildgoose, the festival have announced a fresh batch of over 100 artists who will be joining them. Among these are some more familiar names, such as dance-punk experimenters PVA, indie maximalists The Orchestra (For Now) and the floor-filling, eardrum-busting Y. Newer acts on the bill include Bristol post-punk outfit My First Time and Cambridge shoegazers The Healing Power of Horses as well as The Haunted Youth, Sunday Mourners, Tsatsamis and World News.

The Great Escape still have many more names to announce and you can check out the full lineup and latest updates at their website here. We’ve got more exciting news about the festival coming soon and will also be back with our detailed guide to the full lineup.