The Windmill presents:
Antifolk Fest 2026
Entry Requirements: 18+
Now in its fifth year at Windmill Brixton, the all-day festival of everything DIY promises performance over polish, arch, anarchic songwriting, and a line up with a bit of everything from protest-folk-punk to indie slacker-rock. South London’s premier chanteur extraordinaire Gary Paradiso returns again to host!
22:00 — Lucy’s Diary
Lucy’s Diary return with their third album ‘Barefoot in Needlepoint Park’, a collection of psychedelic ghost stories, sexual misadventures and emotionally exposed songwriting. Led by Lucy Joplin and JJ Crash, the band combines punk-pop energy with stranger soundscapes. Outsider pop, psych, post-punk and antifolk collide with force.
https://blangrecords.bandcamp.com/album/barefoot-in-needlepoint-park
21:00 — David Cronenberg’s Wife
David Cronenberg’s Wife are London antifolk veterans whose songs inhabit uncomfortable territory between dark humour, abject sadness and the grotesque. Three BBC 6 Music sessions, tours with Jeffrey Lewis and a support slot for The Fall barely explain the experience. This year they released their fifth album ‘Department of Biology’, leading to a review in – of all places – Classic Rock magazine who called it ‘Preposterously good’.
https://www.instagram.com/cronenbergswife/
20:00 — End of Life Care Plan
Sheffield’s End of Life Care Plan describe themselves as a noise-nuisance-garage-skronk three-piece crawling around the netherworld of the Steel City. Expect abrasive guitars with a nod to The Fall, ragged rhythms, experimental instincts and music that makes genre boundaries look faintly ridiculous. A hidden gem, making their London debut.
https://www.facebook.com/E0LcP/
19:20 — En Heat
En Heat describe themselves as avant-garde antifolk disco-psych rock’n’roll, which is probably the most economical description. Led by Filthy Pedro and featuring Oliver Fisk, Disco Stu (David Cronenberg’s Wife’s former drummer) and Adam Bell from Fruity Water, they combine disco grooves, garage-rock energy and surreal storytelling. Wrestling masks, trillionaires on the moon and dancing are all possible.
18:40 — Too Close to Vomit
Too Close to Vomit is the latest incarnation of New York antifolk songwriter Ben Garber. Garber’s songs have always treated good taste as optional, colliding absurd titles, crude humour, musical invention and smart songwriting. Expect real life with a touch of surrealism, the absurd with the everyday – just don’t ask too many questions.
https://tooclosetovomit.bandcamp.com/
18:00 — Murphy’s Medicine
Brighton’s Murphy’s Medicine make hooky, slightly wonky indie pop with dual vocals, glistening guitars and a knack for turning everyday situations into strange little songs. Their music sits somewhere between the Vaselines and Belle and Sebastian and fit nicely into Brighton’s off-kilter scene of indie slacker-pop and alternative rock. Warm, melodic and quietly surreal, they are newcomers worth catching live.
https://www.instagram.com/murphysmedicineband/
17:20 — Steve White & The Protest Family
Steve White & The Protest Family make acoustic folk-punk with teeth. Their songs combine detailed narratives, acapella observation, ripping guitar and unapologetic politics, taking aim at inequality, hypocrisy and modern absurdities. Think punk minstrels, fractured music hall and class-conscious songwriting: direct, funny, angry and tuneful music with a heart.
16:50 — Alex Hale and the Private Sector
Nottingham’s Alex Hale and the Private Sector make alternative rock for people who prefer their guitar music literate, funny and slightly awkward. Drawing on The Mountain Goats, Modest Mouse, The National and indie touchstones, they specialise in big-hearted songs, sharp lyrics and anti-cool rock’n’roll energy.
16:10 — Gene Vincent Price & The Gorehounds
Gene Vincent Prince occupies that sweet spot where outsider art and antifolk stop being useful descriptions. Originally conceived as a one-off tribute to The Cramps, Gene Vincent Price & The Gorehounds have since mutated into their own horror show of psychobilly, garage punk and gothic blues. Expect songs from somewhere adjacent to normality: strange, direct, funny and impossible to neatly categorise.
https://www.instagram.com/genevincentprice
15.45 TBC
Hosted by Gary Paradiso, South London’s premier chanteur extraordinaire. Christened “The Scott Walker of Divorced Dads” and bringing his own brand of light-entertainment which goes beyond the pale, he returns once again as Antifolk UK’s incomparable compère…
15.30 DOORS