This will be the eighth edition of our gathering of radical music makers, artists and fellow devotees of cultural exploration. Four days of listening, sharing, dancing, and hanging out, spread across the best spaces in Glasgow.

First and foremost, we have always set out to challenge our own ideas and preconceptions of what a festival is and what it can be. Each year we have endeavoured to bring new music to the table and to support artists who are forging their own ways; questioning and expressing ideas that challenge the status quo and cultural norms.

With 2019’s edition we feel these ideas are even more pertinent. Fighting the creeping isolationist agenda and loom of age-old hierarchies, our desire to work locally and internationally—to hold on to and mutually nurture everyone’s capacity to be deeply human, deeply connected and deeply alive—is stronger than ever.

There are many highlights across the four days: provocative and timely Baile Funk from Brazil; a plethora of new commissions and collaborations; skewed and off-the-grid hip-hop; electrifying new groups crashing dissonance, seriousness and joyousness head on; Guarapo from Barranquilla; some of the best new musicians on the fringes of free jazz and improvisation; thrilling polyrhythmic drumming from Iran; minimalist yodelling; mischievous sound art; film screenings and… We could keep going, but in some ways the festival should be taken as a whole, as a journey from beginning to end. It is how we see it and hope you can join us. We make this festival together.