I arrived at a car park in Wrexham and whilst confusedly staring at the parking ticket machine, was offered a parking ticket from a passer-by. Arriving at Tŷ Pawb to collect my wrist band I discovered a food court, where I bought some great veggie gyros from the Pie’d Pie’per. I sat down and quickly made friends with the people around me. This was my initial perception of the festival; lovely, friendly and keen to meet your needs. This experience continued throughout.
The friends I made included two people from America who have been travelling to the festival every year for 8 years. “It’s a great festival, the diversity is wonderful and we get to meet such fantastic people” they said. As I’m reflecting on the weekend, I agree. Whilst on the website, Focus Wales says it was established to provide a music showcase event for the Welsh Music Industry. The festival is in its 14th year and has expanded to deliver a truly international line up. They also have a film festival and a conference, but I am here for the music and there are far too many bands I want to see to fit a film in.
Before I get to the many bands, I just want to say how gorgeous Wrexham is. I’d never been there before, but the lovely Tudor buildings, greenery and the beautiful St Giles Parish Church (one of the event venues) was the perfect scene for a multi venue festival. I think Focus Wales must do loads for Wrexham’s tourism as I am already planning another trip just to go to a gig and enjoy a night out.
I had nearly 50 bands on my list that I wanted to see. I managed to see 14. There wasn’t a bad one in the bunch but I’m going to talk about my favourites in the order that I saw them.
Bee Asha & The Band Tees
Bee Asha was my biggest surprise of the festival. My initial research on YouTube didn’t prepare me for how wonderful their live performance would be. Bee Asha is a spoken word musician born and living in Edinburgh. Performing with her band, The Band Tees, she gave one of the most moving performances I’ve experienced. Her song ‘Don’t Jump’ had me in tears. This, combined with her encouragement to check in with friends brought a humanity to her set that was hard not to feel. Check them out here.
Nxdia
Hailing from Manchester, their name is pronounced Nadia but spelt differently, as in their own words ‘I’m a little bit pretentious’. The band were brilliant but Nxdia’s performance was extraordinary. Their song ‘Eyes on Me’, which they introduced by saying ‘I wrote this when I was 16, you can tell’ worked perfectly as it really was impossible to take your eyes of them. Singing directly to you, almost as if it was a conversation with you, they gave us poppy rocky anthems about growing up, love and toxic relationships, in a lighthearted witty and totally danceable way.
Twst
London-based Welsh singer, songwriter and producer Chloé Davis performs as Twst. The self-described genre fluid artist came to stage with keys, synth and a sampler. Dressed in a full Wrexham kit she was akin to an angel-voiced football rave pixie. The song ‘Sugared Up’, set to the nutcracker sugar plum fairy melody will be my earworm for the next few weeks.
Begonia
Playing in the very beautiful St Giles Parish Church, Begonia started her set by stating that she would mostly be singing about her discomfort with religion. Then she sang a song about leaving the church. Followed by a song called ‘Heaven’ which was about finding your way after faith, followed by a song about hot dogs and depression. Her voice, belting out with the power of an opera singer, resonating from the acoustics of the building, juxtaposed against her lyrical description of the fear that faith instilled in her, was a stark and beautiful contrast. She mentioned several times how weird the experience was for her. For me it was a beautiful and powerful representation of a post faith journey creating a deep, creative and seemingly wonderful human…with an amazing voice.
Nesha Nycee
Hip Hop artist Dawnesha Williams, widely known as Nesha Nycee started her set by saying she has come here from Venus, via Atlanta, to spread positivity, and she did. Her massively energetic set, with punchy rhythmic lines and big cinematic breaks got the crowd dancing and kept us there. In between songs she encouraged us to look at each other, say, I appreciate you and hug each other. All that and she was a mint dancer, she filled the stage with a positive ethereal presence. Loved it!
The Red Stains
Mancunian four-piece band The Red Stains were the Focus Wales standout act for me. Overwhelmingly good, I tried to take photos but there was so much going on that I gave up and just enjoyed the performance.
Lead singer Natalie Emslie had the energy of a mischievous child, but one that you wouldn’t want to mess with and would definitely want in your corner if you had a struggle ahead.
The connection between Natalie and the rest of the band was intense and it brought a special kind of magic to the set. It made you feel like you were witnessing something intimate. At the same time, the music was perfect.
Mid gig we were asked if we were ready for some gender anarchy – we obviously were, and the place exploded with ‘Fluid’, with its rockabilly bass riff and feisty punk edge.
Throughout the performance the band were everywhere, seriously there was too much going on to try to capture in this review. Natalie was crawling along the bar, then lay on the floor in the crowd. Grace, lead guitar, was in the crowd. It was an absolute joy, I will not be forgetting it anytime soon and will definitely be at many more Red Stains gigs.
Also, they are playing LOUD WOMEN’s Introducing Stage on Sunday 4 August at Rebellion Festival!
LIINES
Wow! The first thing to say is, what absolute pros. Lead singer Zoe McVeigh had a bit of a nightmare at the start. The strap broke on her guitar. I would have crumbled, my partner mumbled that this is his worst nightmare. Zoe jokingly said “this is great, I don’t feel exposed at all”. An audience member lent her a guitar and we were all relieved. From here they absolutely smashed it. Playing in a small pub called the Parish, the noise coming from the stage was immense. Even though she was playing a borrowed guitar, it was like the instrument was an extension of her. I was completely enraptured by her voice, the drummer was incredible and really entertaining, bass was awesome. All incredible individual performances but as a band they got the energy going and created such an electric atmosphere.
Tara Bandito
I had been waiting for this act all weekend. After checking out her song ‘Unicorn’ and then obsessively listening to everything she ever made, I was so ready for this performance. Dancey, synthy, motivational singer Tara is now my shero. The multilinguist, multi instrumentalist rave queen introduced her song ‘Blerr’ by saying “this is for any woman who struggles with themselves. I see you, I hear you, I feel you”. Then went on to sing the most beautiful poppy ballad.
This is exactly the act that I want to see at every festival and rave ever. And she plays the keytar, I bloody love a keytar.
There’s so much more I could gush about. Moira and Clare, so awesome I saw them twice, Charm of Finches same, Eadyth at the St Giles Parish was marvellous, Kitty was great, Lila Zing was the first act I saw and an absolute diva. So many good things. Well done Focus Wales. Da iawn!