REVIEW: The Sonder Festival - Various Venues, Manchester.

The definition of Sonder is – the realisation that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own. This is not only the name of this Manchester Music And Arts Festival but also the underlying message that the organisers are attempting to convey to the young people in attendance. When you consider that more than 40% of people under the age of 21 now wear headphones when in public places, removing the need to communicate with others, this is clearly an attempt to reverse this trend.

What I can tell you about the Sonder Festival is that it contains some of the best music from local bands that you could possibly imagine. None of these bands are yet properly established and in many cases you might not have even heard the names, but trust me we have some amazing local talent in the North West and Sonder is the perfect place to showcase this.

The festival took place over a number of different venues this year – namely the Bread Shed, FAC251, Night People, Hatch, Sandbar and Joshua Brooks. All of these venues are in the University area of Manchester and all are within a 10 minute walk of each other, which is perfect when you are trying to see as many performers as possible.

This was the third year of Sonder and it took place across four days – 27 through to 30 September, and I was fortunate to be able to visit on two of those days and I definitely think I saw many of the best artists on show.

Headlining the Bread Shed on the Friday night was The Winachi Tribe – a complex 6-piece outfit formed in 2015 in Warrington. They have been described as “an electro funk soul collective” but when hearing them live you can also add a dose of indie to this. They already have a music video featuring Keith Allen and another with Tommy Flanagan and after features in publications such as the LA Times, NME and Manchester Evening News you might be hard pushed to call them an up and coming act. However, they still finding their way in the industry and live performances like this will only enhance their already impressive reputation. Big things are predicted for The Winachi Tribe and this prediction is very well justified.

The Backhanders were the other act headlining on the Friday, this time at FAC251. They are a 4-piece band from Manchester with an impressive lead singer in Stephen Chadwick. I particularly enjoyed his short acoustic set where he was able to showcase his vocal ability to its full potential. I was a little disappointed with the full band set, where it felt like they were going through the motions a little – granted the crowd was quite small but I think The Backhanders had a lot more to give.

The biggest surprise of Friday night for me was the performance of The Jade Assembly, a band I knew very little about before I saw them play at The Bread Shed.  As I walked into the venue, they had just started the first song of their set “Feel The Rage” and whilst I had only intended to stay for a couple of songs I was immediately hooked and I stayed for the whole set. They cracked effortlessly through their whole set with such an intensity that I simply could not take my eyes of it – I was mesmerised from start to finish. The Jade Assembly are a 4-piece rock band from Bolton and lead singer John Foster announced during the set that they recently celebrated their 6 year anniversary.  Watch out for the name, I have absolutely no doubt that they will do big things in this industry and they definitely added me to their fan base here.

The Saturday night at Sonder was much more of the same, flitting between venues to see as many acts as I could. My first stop was Night People on Princess Street where I made a special trip out early to see Wanderlust. They are a seven-piece band from various parts of the UK, although lead singer Eirianna is from Greece. Performing at Night People were only four out of the seven which I suspect was down to space restrictions at the venue (small stage area) but they still managed to put on a superb performance. I particularly enjoyed a song called “I’m Not Dead”, a brand new track that they had never previously played live.

My final stop of the festival was a short trip to The Bread Shed to see Stoke-On-Trent Indie band Camens who only formed last year. They were a couple of songs into their set when I arrived but these young lads clearly have a lot of talent. It’s not hard to see that they have been born out of bands like The Wombats and The Vaccines but there is more than a little influence from the Gallagher brothers. This is far from being a criticism and from what I saw they have some excellent new material that they will be releasing very soon.

I also saw Bolton four-piece Our Fold at The Bread Shed and they put on what might just be the best set I saw during my two days. They have a lot of Nirvana / Foo Fighters about them but they still have their own very distinctive sound. They have a huge sound and a little bit of an Indie vibe about them as well, something that mixed very well. Our Fold have already got quite an impressive set of festival appearances behind them at Glastonbury, Bestival, Leeds and Reading – I can definitely imagine them playing in front of much bigger crowds at bigger venues. Watch this space!

Overall, my experience of the Sonder Festival was a very positive one. The talent on show is simply amazing and I urge as many of you as possible to seek out some of the acts I have mentioned in this review. I commend the organisers of Sonder for putting on such a well organised festival with some superb venues in Manchester, and with tickets priced at just £10 per day or £20 for the whole four days I can only imagine that this event will grow in popularity year on year.


Reviewer – John Fish
on - 28 and 29/9/18