Starting small in 2015, Manchester Punk Festival is now in its ninth year. The three-day event is put together by TNSrecords, Anarchistic Undertones, and Moving North, and attracts both bands and fans from around the globe. They have a well-deserved reputation for putting together a diverse line-up of some of the best DIY punk, ska, and hardcore bands in the scene, and this year is no different. With such a packed line-up, it was not an easy task to narrow it down, but I’ve picked out a few must-see bands from the line-up to feature.
Our first featured band is Goo, a fuzzy indie-punk band from Keighley, West Yorkshire. Forming in 2020 as a way to stay sane during the pandemic, the line-up is made up of members from Sounds of Swami, Fekla and Loomer.
Read on to see what vocalist/guitarist Tanisha Badman has to say about the bands influences, and who she’s looking forward to seeing at MPF:
For anyone not familiar with your music, how would you describe your sound?
We take influence from a lot of different places. We mainly bonded as a band over our love of 90s grunge so there’s a bit of that in there. We’ve been described as indie-punk which is pretty bang on. To sum up, I’d say we draw from bands like Pavement and Courtney Barnett, but then also from bands like The Beths and The Buzzcocks. Plus we named ourselves after a Sonic Youth album so we hope some of that comes through.
If you had to recommend one of your songs to a new listener, which one would it be?
This is tough! All of our songs are so different, I’d probably recommend ‘Call In Sick’. It’s a fun song that most people can relate to. And it covers a lot of bases, musically, I think.
Are there any bands you’re particularly excited to see over the weekend?
SO many! Definitely Martha, King Prawn, Scream and Random Hand. False Advertising and Fresh, for sure. Actually discovered Soot Sprite from being announced and absolutely love it. It’s gonna be a packed weekend of awesome music – it’ll be hard to choose where to go.
What else are you up to this year?
We have a single called ‘You’re In Mono’ coming out on the 10th May, and we’re doing a release gig in Keighley for that at Studio 5 Live. Then a week after that we’re heading to Europe for a tour, these are the dates!
18.05.24 – The Other Side, Peer, BE
19.05.24 – Alkmaar BierHuis, Alkmaar, NL
21.05.24 – Supersonic, Paris, FR
22.05.24 – Urgence Disk Records, Geneva CH
23.05.24 – Le Brin De Zinc, Barberaz, FR
24.05.24 – The Secret Place, Montpellier, FR
25.05.24 – Burdigala Festival, Bordeaux, FR
26.05.24 – Say Cheese, Aucard V, Tours, FR
Thank you so much to Tanisha for answering these questions. Goo will be playing at Yes! on the Sunday of MPF, at 16:30.
You can find Goo on Facebook // Instagram // Bandcamp
Manchester Punk Festival takes place 29-31 March 2024 – full details and tickets here
