Feature: 5 New Bands Discovered at Mad Cool Festival

Now in its third year Mad Cool Festival has already delivered some stunning line-ups, with the likes of The Who, The Prodigy, Foo Fighters and Green Day all featuring in past editions of the Madrid-based festival. This year was perhaps one of the most stacked line-ups to date, not only in the small history of the festival, but also compared to other festivals around Europe. Spanning across seven different stages this years edition featured some amazing acts, from Tame Impala and Arctic Monkeys, to Depeche Mode and Pearl Jam. But where most of the attention was drawn to the headline acts, and I guess understandably so, this year also featured a bunch of fantastic up-and-coming bands too. Both local and international artists took to the two smaller stages, called the ‘Mondo Sonoro Stage’ and the ‘Thunder Bitch Stage’, and it was here where I had the pleasure of discovering these five new (to me) bands.

Live Review: Mad Cool Festival ‘London Sessions’ with Haux and Monarchy @ Koko, London

Mad Cool Festival presented the first of their ‘London Sessions’ events on Tuesday evening at the iconic Koko in Camden, and I was delighted to be in attendance. Fresh from announcing that Queens of the Stone Age will be the first headliner at Mad Cool 2018 (taking place between the 12-14 July in Madrid), the festival got to work to spread the word with the first ‘London Sessions’, a potential series of events to showcase what Mad Cool is about. The event was free with invitation from the Mad Cool website, and it was a great way to kick off proceedings. Featuring American artist Haux and London-based duo Monarchy, it was a night full of smoky electronic synths and eerie atmsopheric vocals.