Empire State Bastard announces the inaugural ‘Bastard Fest’ in Sheffield

Empire State Bastard will hold their own festival in Sheffield next month, called Bastard Fest.

Fresh from a US tour supporting Sleep Token, the supergroup of Biffy Clyro’s Simon Neil and Oceansize’s Mike Vennart will headline the bill, with Bitch Falcon bassist Naomi Macleod and ex-Slayer drummer Dave Lombardo.

The event will take place at Sheffield’s Corporation on July 13 and features a host of British metal heavyweights including Heriot, Conjurer, Pupil Slicer and Sheffield’s Hidden Mothers. It comes a day after the band’s performance at the 2000trees Festival.

Tickets go on sale tomorrow (June 20) on the venue’s website and See Tickets.

Empire State Bastard released their debut album ‘Rivers Of Heresy’ last year. In a four-star review of the album, NME described the record as “wonderfully weird Biffy spin-off ultraviolence”, adding: “With help from Slayer’s Dave Lombardo and Bitch Falcon’s Naomi Macleod – take us on a wild grindcore ride.”

After a summer of Empire State Bastard festival engagements, Neil has more engagements in the diary with Biffy Clyro later this year. They’ll be headlining Victorious Festival in August and playing a huge outdoor show at Halifax’s Piece Hall on the same weekend.

In October they will play a series of shows in London and Glasgow, called ‘A Celebration Of Beginnings’, which will showcase their first three full-length albums – ‘Blackened Sky’ (2002), ‘Vertigo of Bliss’ (2003). and “Infinity Land” (2004).

Promising to “reward the hardcore fans who have been with the band throughout their journey to date”, Biffy will play three consecutive nights at London’s O2 Shepherds Bush Empire before returning to Glasgow’s Barrowland Ballroom for the first shows live on location since 2014. .

“That twisted take on everything has always been so us – even down to our band name,” said lead singer Simon Neil. NME in 2020, reflecting on their early years. “If you had told someone from that era that we would be the ones staying for 20 years, then they would probably have laughed in your face.”

“If you had told anyone we would be staying 20 years, they would have laughed.”