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Diary Dates.
Nina Nastasia – Sunday 16 April
The Musician
Hearing her voice is like being wrapped in silk sheets and slowly rocked into a blissful state of peace and relaxation. She is compared to Nick Cave and PJ Harvey, but Nina Nastasia has a dark, unnerving strength all of her own. The US has produced few original singer-songwriters so in touch with its contemporary condition.
Liqueur: A tribute to The Cure – Friday 21 April
Duffy’s Bar
Enjoy a night of all your favourites from The Cure performed by Norwich’s Liqueur.
Millie Manders & The Shut Up – Friday 21 April
The Musician
Millie Manders and The Shutup create cross-genre punk that is hard to ignore. With lyricism that pokes fun, draws you in or leaves you questioning social norms teamed with incredible vocal dexterity, grinding guitars, irresistible horn hooks and a pumping rhythm section.
The Oozes – Tuesday 25 April
The Soundhouse
The Oozes are Queer-Punk Londoners with members Tom Gilbert (Lead Vocals), Ciara Clarke (Bass Guitar), Olly Chrich (Drums) and Cherry Cicely (Electric Guitar).
Jay Lewis – Friday 28 April
The Soundhouse
James “Jay” Lewis is a singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist from Liverpool. He is best known as the frontman of Liverpool band Cracatilla and current guitarist with the Zutons, also bassist for the band Cast, and as lead guitarist during comeback shows for seminal Liverpool group The La’s.
Diesel Park West – Friday 28 April
The Musician
DPW were blood and thunder poets of rock’s mercurial terrains in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Their best songs were potent charges directed at the spiritual decay and confusion of the times. An English U2, they became a favourite critical reference point, but the seams they mined were deeper in rock’s rich strata. They studied and effortlessly recast the vibrant purity of Creedence, the sonic alchemy of the Byrds, the raw nerved melodic toughness of The Beatles and the cathartic thrust of The Stones.
Buzzard Buzzard Buzzard – Friday 5 May
Firebug
Cardiff band making indie dream pop with songs that explore weighty concepts of time, money, politics and vanity.
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PREVIEW: Maisie Peters heads to Leicester on UK tour
Engrossed in the world of books, Maisie Peters originally wanted to be an author before realising she could turn her stories into songs. Having written her first track at just nine years old, she began honing her songwriting skills, crafting the blueprint for her honest, witty and wholly relatable diary-style songs. Over time, she began cultivating what is now one of the most dedicated fanbases in modern pop. Sparking a label bidding war whilst still in school, Maisie eventually signed to Atlantic Records in 2018 and released her debut EP, ‘Dressed Too Nice For A Jacket’, later that year.
In the years that have followed, Maisie has firmly established herself as one of the UK’s brightest new talents, racking up over a billion global streams and earning famous fans like Taylor Swift, Phoebe Bridgers and Sam Smith. 2021 saw her sign to Ed Sheeran’s Gingerbread Man Records, become one of the youngest musicians in history to write and curate a soundtrack for the second season of Apple TV+’s ‘Trying’ and follow in the footsteps of Billie Eilish and Megan Thee Stallion as an Apple Music Up Next artist. The year culminated with the release of her critically-acclaimed debut album, ‘You Signed Up For This’, which shot straight in to the Official Charts at No. 2. With her star continuing to ascend in 2022, Maisie went on to sell-out London’s Eventim Apollo in just an hour, play her second sold-out US headline tour and support Ed Sheeran on his mammoth UK/EU stadium tour, with five more dates confirmed for the North American run in 2023.
After a year of scheming and crafting, Maisie Peters is now ready to share what she’s been conjuring up this year – her brand new album, ‘The Good Witch’, arriving via Gingerbread Man Records/Asylum on 16 June. Pre-order is available now HERE.
Written in real time during her whirlwind 2022 touring schedule, ‘The Good Witch’ served as a time capsule for Maisie, enabling her to chronicle a period of time in which she was searching for balance between career highs and personal lows.
Maisie explains: “This is my heart and soul, my blood on the page, the collection of stories that I’ve managed to capture in the past year. A true chronicle of my life in recent history, it is my own twisted version of a breakup album and it all draws upon the same couple of months’ worth of experiences and inspirations. It ducks and weaves between the real and surreal, and centres my own universe, of which I am of course the keeper of the keys and the holder of the cards – the good witch, if you will. It goes from light to dark in the flip of a switch and I hope takes you on a journey whereby the end you feel like you’ve gotten lost in someone else’s planet for a bit.”
As well as the new album, Maisie is undertaking a large UK tour alongside a summer of festival appearances.
See Maisie Peters live at Leicester’s O2 Academy on Wednesday 19 April. Tickets are sold out but keep an eye on O2 Academy Leicester’s social media for any possible late availability.
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WEEKLY PLAYLIST
Deciding which gigs to hit up over the coming weeks? Check out our playlist of acts you can see live in Leicester.
Have a listen and get in touch to tell us which tracks you’re loving.