Details of the Glastonbury Festival 2020 Emerging Talent Competition, which offers acts the chance to appear on the main stage at the iconic event, have been announced.

The competition is open for entries between 9am Monday 27 January until 5pm Monday February 2020 via the official festival website.

Those entering need to supply one of their original songs on Soundcloud and a video of themselves playing live. This can be at a venue, studio or even in their front room.

As well as a main stage slot the winner is handed a £5,000 talent development prize from the PRS Foundation and two runners up will receive £2,500.

Neonfiller among the judges

This year Neonfiller.com’s Joe Lepper is once again among the longlist judges. Our job is to whittle down the entries to a longlist of 90 acts.

A panel of judges, including Glastonbury Festival organisers Michael and Emily Eavis, will then select eight of these long listed acts to appear at a live finals in Pilton, which is near the Somerset based festival site.

For the last five competitions all eight finalists have appeared at the festival. See last year’s live finals review here.

Last year’s eight finalists included Roma Palace, one of Joe’s three longlist entries for 2019. We caught up with them in August last year to review their follow up single You.

In October, we also checked in with Saachi and Laura Goldthorp, who also made our long list selection on the back of their impressive Soundcloud and video clips.

Roma Palace performinh at the Glastonbury ETC 2019 finals (pic by Matt Turner)

As with previous years Neonfiller.com will be posting regular updates of the acts that are impressing us during judging and the eventual winners.

Previous winners

Previous winners have included She Drew the Gun, who have gone from strength to strength after winning in 2016. Another notable winner is Declan McKenna, who signed for Columbia shortly after picking up the top prize in 2015.

ETC 2016 winners She Drew The Gun (pic by Joe Lepper)

Last year’s winner Marie White has since signed with Decca Records and Universal Music Publishing Group. As well as performing at Glastonbury she also supported Keane at the Royal Albert Hall last year.

“It’s always such a pleasure to hear the latest crop of amazing, undiscovered music that’s out there,” said Emily Eavis.

“Over the years, the Emerging Talent Competition has helped us to unearth so many incredible artists from across the genres – dozens of whom have been given slots at the Festival. I can’t wait to hear this year’s entries.”

Inspired by the Emerging Talent Competition Neonfiller.com reviews the small stages each year at the Glastonbury Festival with a focus on new and emerging acts. We are looking forward to visiting these lesser known venues at the festival again this year for its 50^th anniversary.

By Joe Lepper, pictures by Joe Lepper and Matt Turner

One of the best parts of being a judge in the Glastonbury Festival Emerging Talent Competition is keeping in touch with the artists that impressed during the selection process.

Last time out our three long listed entries were Brighton band Roma Palace, singer-songwriter Laura Goldthorp and indie and jazz act Saachi.

Roma Palace made it through to the last eight shortlisted finalists and appeared at last year’s festival. They also impressed us recently with their new single You.

Roma Palace performinh at the Glastonbury ETC 2019 finals (pic by Matt Turner)

This month we have also caught up with Saachi and Laura.

Saachi

Saachi lead singer Saachi Sen has let us know that in October she is releasing a new single Dark.

This comes amid a busy year for Saachi having played festivals including Cambridge Big Weekend and Pride in London.

Released as a solo track, Dark was part recorded at London’s Abbey Road and is “about being proud of who you are, no matter what preconception the world could have of you.”

As with her Glastonbury Festival Emerging Talent Competition entry, Dark also impresses us, showcasing Saachi’s great song writing and superb voice. It’s got a great message too.

Laura Goldthorp

Meanwhile, Laura Goldthorp’s track Candy Shops is still earworming its way nicely through our noggins. She’s back with another slice of great pop with a new single Supernova.

This is the first single off an upcoming EP and can be found via her social media sites.

According to Laura, the track is an “honest exploration of creative anxiety”.

by Joe Lepper

This year’s Glastonbury Festival was all about the sunshine. With no rain or mud the site was full of smiles. Getting about from stage to stage was far simpler. This gave us a good chance to investigate the small stages, that are often away from the glare of the television cameras. They also feature some of the event’s up and coming stars and established acts alike.

Here’s some of our highlights:

William’s Green Stage

Once again this small venue excelled at promoting new and emerging acts, with Amyl and Sniffers, from Australia among the best. Performing on the Friday, lead singer Any Taylor was almost upstaged by the mullets of the rest of the band. Not quite though as she snarled through tracks such as Cup of Destiny. Three minute punk pop songs across the board meant their set flew by.

Amyl and the Sniffers

Speaking of snarling through tracks, Irish punk quintet Fontaines DC were busy at the event with gigs at various venues. We were lucky to catch their fiery show at William’s Green which showed they have ready made Festival favourites already, despite being one of the event’s newest acts. Too Real and Boys in the Better Land in particular sounded great. Worth noting that in lead singer Grian Chatten they have a great frontman who patrols the stage frantically, with more than a note of Joy Division’s late great Ian Curtis about him. It was like he was in another place at times – a very angry place indeed.

Fontaines DC

Snapped Ankles are another new act to offer a surprising Festival highlight show. Looking like Hall and Oats in the wilderness, dressed as trees and forest creatures they looked the part. The music of frantic dance rock appealed too. In terms of stage prescence they nailed it.

Snapped Ankles

Special mention goes to Sundara Karma who I last saw in the larger John Peel stage during a fairly lacklustre set. Here they were harder, faster and better. A treat for the small crowd assembled.

Sundara Karma at William’s Green

Avalon Stage

Tucked away near the south-east corner of the festival site is the Avalon Stage, which offered up some impressive sets from festival regulars and those making a return. Steeleye Span were among those we saw, with a mix of original and new members, churning out a back catalogue of fine folk rock, especially Alison Gross, about witches.

Steeleye Span

Our highlight was Morcheeba, who were playing for the first time at the Glastonbury Festival since 2003. Often seen as the lesser cousin of the likes of Massive Attack and Portishead they should surely be seen alongside such trip hop greats, with our favourite set of the festival. Hits from Big Calm were the crowd’s favourites, as was an impressive version of David Bowie’s Let’s Dance.

Morcheeba

The Acoustic Stage

Another venue primed for the wandering music fan is the Acoustic Stage. It features one of the best acoustics at the site and an eclectic line up with the likes of Hawkwind and Keane on stage. Here we’ll mention a couple of our favourites, with Grace Petrie putting in a great performance elevated over the years from some of the site’s smallest venues to the luxury if the Acoustic Stage. She’s a self confessed protest singer and like Billy Bragg she combines songs of politics well with other themes of love and growing up. Black Tie, her ode to her teenage self, was among many highlights.

Grace Petrie

Rodney Brannigan had a great band in tow for his bluesy rock set but it was his solo meanderings featuring instrumentals played on not one, but two guitars that most impressed. The secret is in the sustain.

Rodney Brannigan

The John Peel Stage

This is as big as this review will get stage wise. Our highlights included an early Saturday afternoon set from Glastonbury Emerging Talent competition winner of 2016 She Drew the Gun. Since scooping the top prize they have used the accolade well, building up their sound and stage prescence. Now complete with backing vocals and light show they get better each time we see them, with tracks from latest release particularly suited to a larger venue. Their version of the Beloved’s Sweet Harmony becoming a steady crowd favourite too.

She Drew the Gun

Low’s light show at this year’s Glastonbury Festival also impressed as the US trio performed their brand of slowcore alternative rock splendidly. While they make good use of feedback the sweet vocals of Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker are what makes them so mesmerising live.

Low

Its worth noting that the first two bands each day at the John Peel Stage are filmed by local film students, which was among the snippets of behind the scenes festival news we heard during the event.

Words and pictures by Joe Lepper

After a two-year gap to let the fields and staff re-energise, Glastonbury Festival is stretching its legs and travelling its unhurried route towards the end of June. The Pyramid stage is clad; resale tickets have sold out (in the customary few minutes);  and the live finals of  the Emerging Talent Competition has awarded its £5,000 PRS Foundation grant and its coveted main stage slot at arguably the world’s most famous music festival.

Roma Palace

The Emerging Talent line-up is always diverse and rarely puts a foot wrong providing great performances.  The variety makes getting into the judges heads tricky, but if there is a trend in recent years we have seen more MCs in the final, without any yet breaking through to win top spot.

Like the last event, in 2017, when Josh Barry’s vocal performance enticed the judges’ ears, this year they went for another stand-out singer. However the judges: Michael and Emily Eavis, representatives from the PRS, Glastonbury’s seasoned bookers, plus BBC Radio’s Huw Stephens – favoured a more melodic voice this time around, with Marie White clinching enough votes to take top spot with her two bitter-sweet compositions.

Aided by songs that suited the slightly subdued crowd that comes with an early start, Marie coped well with being first up. Tracey Chapman comparisons were made as part of her introduction, and her performance was authentic and moving. The tone and delivery of the second song ‘Out of time’ bears comparison with one of Adele’s tales of heartache and longing.

My personal on-the-night favourites were LIINES and Che Lingo. LIINES are in the middle of supporting Sleaford Mods, and are surely making fans with their challenging post-punk bursts. Extra points to them for rocking the “double-black Gene Vincent for the new millennium” look.  Che LIngo didn’t disappoint, he was charismatic and confidently owned that stage. At times he picked up the baton that Dizzy Rascal dropped a while back, and “Same Energy” had attitude to spare and unexpected layers that touched on A Tribe Called Quest.

The two representatives from the West Country are both well equipped to fill bigger venues. Iiola followed Marie White with another powerful vocal performance. The song ‘Sickly Sweet’ has a chorus to stick in the head and got the crowd bobbing; whilst Bristol’s Swimming Girls – the first band to fill the stage – added some polish and indie pop/rock to the night. They have some Simple Minds pomp and singer / bassist Vanessa has a distinctive delivery, a healthy sneer, and a hint of Ciccone. Clearly experienced and gig-ready, their sound is waiting for an anthem to take hold.

Whilst remaining totally unbiased, the first Neon Filler pick to make it through the final – Roma Palace – did themselves enormous credit. Their infectious guitar-led indie had echoes of Blossoms early outings, and entwined influences from beyond the shores of their current Brighton home.

Everyone is a winner on a night like this so Yamaya and Shunaji – get honourable mentions for their respective afrobeat fusion and jazz-influenced hip-hop outings. Both these acts chose to showcase just one song in their sets which left me, and possibly the judges, wanting to hear more to get a more rounded view of their repertoire.

Another good night to see some of the musical talent from across the nation and I for one will look up at least four of the acts at the main festival in June. Still no Hip Hop / MC winner though, but Flohio from the 2017 final is proving that just getting to the final can be enough to herald a growing career.

Words and pictures by Matt Turner

For more information about the competition and live final click here.

The 90 acts vying for a main stage slot and a £5,000 prize in the Glastonbury Festival Emerging Talent Competition 2019 have been revealed.

The successful acts were chosen by 30 music online music writers, including Neonfiller’s Joe Lepper. Each writer selected three acts, with Joe picking singer-songwriter Laura Goldthorp, Brighton band Roma Palace and London jazz pop act Saachi.

Songs submitted by the acts can be found via the Glastonbury Festival website.

The acts will now be whittled down to an eight-strong shortlist, who will compete in a live finals next month in Pilton, near to the festival site.

Main stage prize

The winners will earn a main stage slot as well as a £5,000 PRS for Music Foundation Talent Development prize. Two runners up will also each be awarded a £2,500 from PRS for Music Foundation.

ETC 2016 winners She Drew The Gun

Previous winners have included She Drew the Gun, who scooped the prize in 2016 and impressed recently during their UK tour. Declan McKenna is another notable winner, signing for Columbia shortly after winning in 2015.

Once again I’m spending an enjoyable February helping to judge the prestigious Glastonbury Festival Emerging Talent Competition.

Along with 29 other music writers, my task is to help whittle down 5,500 entries to a 90 strong long list from which eight acts will be chosen to compete in a battle of the bands contest in April.

With a main stage slot and a £5,000 PRS for Music Foundation Talent Development prize up for grabs this is one the best talent competitions around for aspiring artists.

As with previous three years I like to focus on some of the acts that have caught my attention so far during judging and are in contention to earn a chance to appear at the Glastonbury Festival.

Here are some that have grabbed my attention so far:

Laura Goldthorp – Candy Shops

Laura Goldthorp entered the competition as a singer/songwriter and she has nailed it on both counts. Her song Candy Shops is a ready made pop classic, with instant radioplay appeal. Her vocals are superb too with this fine song delivered beautifully in the live clip she submitted. Why is she not already a household name? She very well may be if she makes my final three and can progress all the way to a main stage slot at the Glastonbury Festival.

Roma Palace – Take My Heart Away

I’m a sucker for some funky guitar playing in my pop music, which meant Roma Palace from Brighton instantly made an impression on me. Smart harmonies at the start of this track also impressed.

Saachi – Raw

This London based jazz/pop group’s lead singer Saachi Sen is enfused with the spirit of the late great Laura Nyro. This clip also shows that sometimes clips filmed in a living room can be the most attention grabbing. Their recent single Redcoat is also worth watching.

by Joe Lepper