With some heavy highlights, the new festival on the scene got off to one hell of a start.

May is somewhat glorious mayhem, truly kicking off festival-season with a number of great festivals to toast the coming summer. Southampton, an underrated area in the landscape of the music industry, has seen the birth of the month’s newest addition: Wanderlust.

Curated by Psych Limited, a promotion collective who have been hosting club nights in Southampton for over a decade, the maiden Wanderlust Festival took place this year across three venues: the 100-capacity Heartbreakers; The 1865 (600 capacity, working men’s club vibes); and, slightly further afield, one of the most iconic institutions in Britain: the legendary Joiners (200 capacity).

The debut was an immensely curated event, with lots of the most exciting emerging acts head to the SO postcode.

With Teeth Machine having pulled out, stepping in for their absence was Lurker, a Southampton-based soloist. In a plume of blue haze, Lurker wonderfully crooned to The Heartbreakers crowd, showing the influence of the New York canon of Lou Reed and Leonard Cohen as well as tinges of Kurt Vile and Nick Cave. Between songs, Lurker explained to the audience that he was not too well after cooking some freshly foraged mushrooms, an important health warning delivered on top of a real lovely set.

Over in 1865, Bristol-based HAAL brought a sonic whirlwind levelling the beautiful space with some wonderfully droney industrial post-rock, akin to Godspeed You! Black Emperor.  A tremendous, if tinnitus-inducing experience.

The set of the day was an early one, with Guildford’s Shtëpi bringing their brand of caustic post-punk and garage-rock-n-roll to Joiners. Like a melting pot of Viagra Boys and The Birthday Party, Shtëpi’s frenetic searing brilliance was an exhilarating and maniacal sweat-storm. It was an utter live force that needs to be experienced from one of the South’s brightest new bands.

After this, a band that could have headlined Wanderlust and Joiners outright, Dream Wife, brought the fun times with their sass-laden punk-pop to a sardine-packed, sweat-filled room. The band delved through a setlist that spanned their catalogue, a highlight being the evergreen banger that is ‘Hey Heartbreaker.’ Following this, Demob Happy shredded so hard, Joiners felt like it could have been reduced to nothing but atoms. The band’s doom-laden, almost a stadium-ready riff riot, sounded as absolutely mega as ever. 

Closing out the festival were South London Windmill graduates Shame, with their frenzied scuzzy-indie-rock-n-roll meets incinerating post-punk to an absolute jam-packed 1865: a festival headliner worthy set.

Overall Wanderlust was a great debut, and with the festival announcing 2025 dates already, it’s already a must-attend festival in the music calendar, that’s truly worthy of a trip to the south-coast.