u/lotdrotterdam

Yesterday, we added 32 lineup additions to the Left of the Dial 2026 programme! ❤️ Here's all confirmed artists so far:

Accessory • Al Cologne • Alien Boy • Alice Costelloe • ashnymph • AtticOmatic • Babe Haven • Bathing Suits • bed • benchwarmer • Ben Kidson • Black Nylon • Bloodworm • bog band • Bramwell • Brooki • Burglar • casual smart • Cherryholt • Child of Prague • Common Holly • COMPOST COMPOST COMPOST • Cosign • Curiosity Shop • Date Camp • DAUFØDT • Echo Northstar • Flowers for the Dead • GARDENS • girlfriend. • Glasshouse Red Spider Mite • Gnarcissists • Gordi • Hillsboro • Holly Head • Hungry • Hyd • Imaginary Husband • Insider Trading • Iskandr • Jackson Roy • Jana Horn • JJ Bull • Juni Habel • LA FLEMME • Lacuna • Latter • LAWN CHAIR • Lemonsuckr • lots of hands • lttl mort • Magasin • Max Sloan • Mek’Dr’Dr • Melanie Baker • Michael Ian Cummings • Midscale • Milkweed • Milo Korbenski • Mindsigh • MLEKO • Monde UFO • Monks • mry • My Purse • Neve Cariad • newhvn • Noonzy • Normal Village • Norman D. Loco • Oslo Twins • Painkiller • Paulie Swan • Perfect Binding • plainhead • pushbike • Pyncher • Rageflower • Rampressure • Ringlets • Ropeburn • Scotstown Dance Band • Serena Clara • ShitKid • Spike Fuck • Stoop Kid • studio20 • sundayclub • Telekura • Thank • The Guest List • The Healing Power of Horses • The Jump Cuts • The Sewing Club • The Slow Country • Tokyo Sea Dragons • Tooth • Tough Cookie • Trip Westerns • TURNSPIT • Twenty One Children • Villagerrr • Wesley & The Boys • wing! • Wyatt • Yoo Doo Right • Zilcho Hamblin + many more

Left of the Dial Festival
21-24 October
Rotterdam

www.leftofthedial.nl

In 2013, so five years before the first edition of Left of the Dial, we flew to Chicago to see one of The Replacements’ reunion shows. As you probably know by now, they’re the band after whose song we named the festival.

They hadn’t performed in over 20 years and were only going to play a couple of shows in the USA. Being the huge fans we are, we got on a plane.

They played Riot Fest, an outdoor festival not unlike any other festival we’ve been to, but the lineup was pretty amazing. We saw Blondie, Guided By Voices, Dinosaur Jr. and tons of other bands. 

However, the thing we loved most about Riot Fest was the way they spoke to their ticketholders. Their emails and website were refreshingly funny and honest. They created a world you just wanted to be part of long before arriving in Chicago.

After 2013, there was no real reason for us to go back to Riot Fest, but we kept our subscription to their newsletter and continued admiring the way they communicated. Time and time again, they proved there’s nothing wrong with doing things your own way. When we started Left of the Dial in 2018, we definitely drew inspiration from them.

Now, a couple of days ago, Riot Fest announced their 2026 lineup and, for the first time, four bands are playing who we consider ‘friends of the family’, meaning they all played Left of the Dial before.

It made us extremely happy in a weird, full-circle kind of way.

Which makes no sense, we know.

We could say it feels really special that friends of the family are playing the festival where we first heard Left of the Dial played live, but in all honesty, when we were watching The Replacements in 2013, we had no idea we were going to name our festival Left of the Dial. We weren’t even seriously thinking about organising a festival at all.

Besides, those friends of the family would have achieved everything they have without ever playing our festival and, moreover, they’ve played, and will play, hundreds of other festivals. Riot Fest will be just another show for them.

Still… it kind of feels like an achievement.

But enough of this embarrassing self-absorbed drivel...

We wish Gurriers, Deadletter, Remember Sports and Cardinals the best time ever in Chicago, and we hope that if they run into anyone involved in Riot Fest marketing, they’ll tell them that, in hindsight, they were slightly life-changing for a small festival in Rotterdam.

Big love,
The rioters of Left of the Dial

PS:
As it turned out, those ‘couple of reunion shows’ eventually became a European tour and, soon after Riot Fest, The Replacements announced a show in Amsterdam. So at the time, it felt a bit pointless that we had gone to the trouble of going to Chicago. But hindsight sometime changes and in today’s hindsight we know it was totally worth it.

Let us start by saying that we're really glad you're reading this. Although, actually, we're pretty sure you're not the one we need to reach.

Please allow us to explain.

Generally speaking, the Left of the Dial ticketholders are the nicest people ever. People who truly look out for each other.

Like a family, almost.

Which is great, but most families also have what we’d like to call a Drunk Uncle. Someone who is usually a pretty decent guy, but turns into a bit of an asshole when drunk.

They start talking louder and their stories get way too long, they’re not as stable on their feet anymore, and endlessly repeating someone’s name in a funny voice suddenly becomes the epitome of humour. However annoying, it’s still your uncle. And being annoying is no reason to kick him out of the family.

Just like being a tad annoying won’t get you kicked out of Left of the Dial.

Don’t get us wrong: there are clear lines that cannot be crossed. And if you do cross them, we’ll immediately confiscate your wristband and ask you to leave. Anyone with half a (sober) brain cell knows exactly what those lines are.

But being a bit loud, dancing over-enthusiastically, or showing the first signs of an alcohol-induced speech impediment is no reason to kick someone out.

That being said, a Drunk Uncle can still ruin a show for you, and we really wish there were an effective way to keep the Drunk Uncle-ness to a minimum, but it's complicated.

You see, Drunk Uncles are hard to reach.

They're not the ones reading this post. Nor our newsletters, website, or service emails in which we clearly state that we expect all our ticketholders to use common sense and behave themselves.

Drunk Uncles just buy tickets and show up.

Someone suggested putting up posters to remind everyone of our code of conduct, or house rules, or whatever you want to call them.

But let's be fair: when in the history of mankind has a poster stopped a drunk person from doing anything?

Someone suggested not serving alcohol at all. That's not really fair to the people who can handle their liquor and besides... Drunk uncle-ness isn't always caused by alcohol. Some people are simply unaware of what others find annoying and are, in fact, sober-drunk uncles.

In conclusion: Not every Drunk Uncle is drunk, and usually they mean absolutely no harm;

- So have some sympathy for the Drunk Uncle, they're only human too;

- On the other hand, don't be afraid to kindly ask a Drunk Uncle to tone it down;

- If one of your friends turns into a Drunk Uncle, send them home;

-But if a random Drunk Uncle turns into a full-blown asshole, call our crew and we'll take care of it.

And finally: Drunk Uncle-ness can creep up on you, so don't forget to take a good look in the mirror every now and then. Check that you're not being a Drunk Uncle yourself and ruining someone else's night.

Big love,

The tipsy aunts of Left of the Dial

PS: Just to be sure: Drunk Uncle is just a metaphor and not gender-specific, of course. It could also be a drunk sister, cousin, or whatever. And like we said, they don't even have to be intoxicated. Drunk Uncle just has a nice rhythm to it. It doesn't really rhyme internally, but it has a bit of sound symmetry. Whatever... please don't be a Drunk Uncle!

https://preview.redd.it/xexz6uxjfbyg1.jpg?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d3cb45acb40b2da2f71f63c963cc9483e93829b2

❤️ Last week we proudly added 35 new amazing artists to the Left of the Dial lineup! ❤️

Please give the warmest welcome to:
u/benchwarmeruk • u/blacknylonband • u/brooki.band • u/childofpragueband • u/compostcompostcompost • u/cosign333 • u/daufodt • u/echonorthstar • u/girlfriendband • u/glasshouseredspidermite • u/hillsboroinc • u/hollyhead.band • u/hungryhungree • u/hyd.earth • u/janus__janus • u/laflemme_band • u/lawnchairmusic • u/lotsofhands • u/magasin.band • u/mekdrdrband • u/mleko.mcr • u/monksband • u/mrymrymry___ • u/normalvillage • u/perfectbindingband • u/pyncher • u/ropeburnropeburnropeburn • u/scotstowndanceband • u/theguestlist.band • u/thehealingpowerofhorses • u/tokyoseadragons • u/toothband • u/toughcookie • u/wingroulette • u/zilcho_hamblin

As the observant viewer may have noticed: u/blacknylonband is not listed on the beautiful lineup poster yet. They only confirmed a few hours ago and by then our graphic designer had already gone home for the day. Things never go as planned, at least not for us and we still wanted to let you know that Black Nylon will be joining us in October, so we included them anyway. 

Left of the Dial Festival
21/22/23/24 October
Rotterdam
www.leftofthedial.nl

Two years ago, The Charlatans frontman Tim Burgess announced a new event in Manchester called Merch Market, where bands can sell their merchandise for free and keep 100% of the income.

To most people that would seem pretty logical. Why wouldn’t a band keep the full 100%? It’s their merch after all. But often, venues or festivals charge bands to sell their merch, sometimes even up to 20% of the revenue.

We don’t. All artists can sell their merch for free at the Left of the Dial Merch Store. We even provide a special print-to-order service for artists who can’t bring their own merch for whatever reason, or don’t have the money to invest in T-shirts and sweaters. All they have to do is send us their design, and we’ll take care of the rest.

This is quite an investment. A hundred plus bands bring their merch to the festival, so we need a lot of staff members to take in all those items. We have to rent a suitable space and we have to stock T- shirts in every size and colour for our print-to-order service. Over 4,000 purchases are made during the festival, which not only require even more staff, but it also means a lot of banking costs. And last but not least, we have to make sure the bands get paid for every sold item which is an administrative hassle.

But we don’t care.

It’s been pretty clear for ages that selling merchandise is crucial for touring bands to make ends meet. So, we decided never to take a percentage of their sales, but to come up with another – rather simple - way to cover our expenses: we also sell our own merch. Luckily, some of you seem to like the Left of the Dial stuff, and we usually sell just enough to more ore less break even!

We never want to compete with the bands, so if you can only buy one item, you should always pick something of theirs. But, if you have a little more to spend, please know that buying Left of the Dial merch is also a way of supporting artists.

And in the unlikely event of us making a massive profit on our own merch, we promise we’ll invest it in something cool. Like an animal shelter, or a fancy motion picture featuring every band that ever played Left of the Dial… or something else, we’ll cross that bridge if the money starts pouring in…

Big love,

The 0% takers of Left of the Dial

Two years ago, The Charlatans frontman Tim Burgess announced a new event in Manchester called Merch Market, where bands can sell their merchandise for free and keep 100% of the income.

To most people that would seem pretty logical. Why wouldn’t a band keep the full 100%? It’s their merch after all. But often, venues or festivals charge bands to sell their merch, sometimes even up to 20% of the revenue.

We don’t. All artists can sell their merch for free at the Left of the Dial Merch Store. We even provide a special print-to-order service for artists who can’t bring their own merch for whatever reason, or don’t have the money to invest in T-shirts and sweaters. All they have to do is send us their design, and we’ll take care of the rest.

This is quite an investment. A hundred plus bands bring their merch to the festival, so we need a lot of staff members to take in all those items. We have to rent a suitable space and we have to stock T- shirts in every size and colour for our print-to-order service. Over 4,000 purchases are made during the festival, which not only require even more staff, but it also means a lot of banking costs. And last but not least, we have to make sure the bands get paid for every sold item which is an administrative hassle.

But we don’t care.

It’s been pretty clear for ages that selling merchandise is crucial for touring bands to make ends meet. So, we decided never to take a percentage of their sales, but to come up with another – rather simple - way to cover our expenses: we also sell our own merch. Luckily, some of you seem to like the Left of the Dial stuff, and we usually sell just enough to more ore less break even!

We never want to compete with the bands, so if you can only buy one item, you should always pick something of theirs. But, if you have a little more to spend, please know that buying Left of the Dial merch is also a way of supporting artists.

And in the unlikely event of us making a massive profit on our own merch, we promise we’ll invest it in something cool. Like an animal shelter, or a fancy motion picture featuring every band that ever played Left of the Dial… or something else, we’ll cross that bridge if the money starts pouring in…

Big love,

The 0% takers of Left of the Dial

This was supposed to be a post about why we are starting a Left of the Dial subreddit, but somehow it turned into a story about how much we love and appreciate you 💙 That’s the way things go sometimes. Still, a small warning: if you’re not into that kind of mushy stuff, better stop reading now.

 We’d like to tell ourselves that we’re tough and seasoned festival organisers who can handle just about anything. But sometimes the world just gets us down. Like last week. Nothing extremely bad happened, but lots of people were being unfriendly and it was just one mishap after another. It drove us into this tiny existential crisis. All we could do was sit around contemplating why on earth we were organising a festival and more importantly, for whom. Slightly pathetic, we know, but hey, we’re only human.

Then two things happened more or less simultaneously.

We were thinking about opening a Reddit account, or maybe a Left of the Dial subreddit, we weren’t sure. None of us are experienced Reddit users, so we had no idea, but we know that a lot of musicians use the platform, so we felt it was something we should learn more about.

In all honesty, we were mostly reluctant, because Reddit users can be quite harsh to newcomers and given our frail mental state we were absolutely not ready to be made fun of. Trying to decipher the unspoken rules of Reddit, we scrolled through endless posts about music and festivals. Much to our surprise, someone posted about Left of the Dial months ago and 6 people responded in the sweetest, most appreciative, well-written and clever way possible. We had no idea who these people were, but they seemed to really understand the festival on a deeper level.

Around the same time, the printer mistakenly delivered our order of stickers twice. We figured it wouldn’t hurt to ask if anyone wanted some, but being in a dismal state of mind, we didn’t really expect any replies. Boy, were we wrong. Within minutes the messages came flooding in. Not only did dozens of you love the idea of receiving stickers, you asked for them in the most respectful and enthusiastic way. Trust us, that level of excitement combined with kind politeness is like a natural antidepressant.

And these definitely answered the question why and for whom we’re organising Left of the Dial.

For you.

It would probably make more sense to tell this on the Sunday morning after Left of the Dial. But usually, that’s the moment we’re beyond tired and we can only think of some cliché like “thanks people, this was one for the books!” So let us take a moment right now to tell you how much we appreciate your contribution to Left of the Dial, whatever it is. Whether you’re an early ticket buyer, a volunteer, a performing artist, an attentive listener, a late night dancer, a very vocal cheerleader, a quiet supporter, or one of our allies in any other way, we love you and you are the reason Left of the Dial is such an amazing festival.

 You’re also the reason we finally feel confident enough to give Reddit a try. Since we’re still finding our way around here, we’ll start by sharing some things you might’ve already seen on our other socials—like practical festival tips and the occasional explanation of why we do things the way we do. Don’t worry though, it’s just to help you get to know us a bit better (if you don’t already). We’ll soon be sharing fresh updates and plenty of random festival goodness too. With a bit of time—and your help—we’ll turn this sub into a space where we can all share experiences and celebrate our favourite festival together.

So yeah—feel free to post whatever you like: questions, stories, things you’re excited about… as long as we keep it nice and respectful (but we’re not too worried, we know you’re the sweetest).

If it turns out to be a depressing experience, we now know exactly what to do to lift our spirits. We’ll just order more stickers. Apparently, good things come from ordering stickers.

 Big love,

The psychoanalysts of Left of the Dial

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You can check out their artist page here!