UPDATE. NOW SOLD OUT. The fes­ti­val is already 85% sold out so if you are think­ing of going, don’t think for too long! Here’s a taste of what’s in store at the always-inno­v­a­tive, Totnes-based weekender.

• Bill Ryder-Jones returns with an inti­mate solo piano and gui­tar show at St Mary’s Church. Bill will per­form favourites from his back cat­a­logue along­side first air­ings of new material.
• Sat­ur­day night will fea­ture a live set from Man­ches­ter post-punk com­pos­er Lonela­dy
• Fri­day night is a Speedy Wun­der­ground takeover as part of the impec­ca­ble label’s tenth birth­day cel­e­bra­tions, with two excit­ing young tal­ents: Heart­worms and explo­sive sax­o­phone and drums duo O.
• Fol­low­ing the announce­ment of Djan­go Django’s huge new fifth LP, Off Plan­et, the band’s drummer/producer Dave Maclean sees a Djan­go Djan­go DJ takeover at Totnes Cinema. 
• Also DJ’ing will be Dept­ford North­ern Soul Club, the gim­mick-free soul big hit­ters who have just been dubbed the No.1 of ‘the 25 most bang­ing club nights in the UK’ by Time Out; Andy Votel of Find­ers Keep­ers Record will bring his esteemed record box­es for a deep dive into the musi­cal unknown. Heav­en­ly Juke­box will also get the par­ty going
• Oth­er musi­cal attrac­tions include the Irish fem­i­nist band M(h)aol; MEMORIALS, which is the new band of Ver­i­ty Sus­man (Elec­tre­lane) and Matthew Simms (Wire), ; Edinburgh’s Eyes Of Oth­ers, who recent­ly released the beau­ti­ful­ly wooz­ing ‘Bewitched by the Flames’ EP on Heav­en­ly Record­ings; a Sea Change debut for Bris­to­lian singer-song­writer Clara Mann at St Mary’s Church; punk trio deep tan play­ing at The Bar­rel House Ball­room on Fri­day, Lon­don based six-piece Tapir! bring the most gor­geous post-folk ana­logue shapes.

A new venue for 2023 is The Alba­tross, the stun­ning com­mu­ni­ty space run by the esteemed and adven­tur­ous Bull Inn. Oppo­site The Bull and next door to Drift Records, The Alba­tross will be host­ing con­ver­sa­tions and oth­er ses­sions across the week­end, which will include Rough Trade Books, White Rab­bit Books and a col­lab­o­ra­tive pro­gramme of culi­nary ses­sions on lazy Sun­day, as part of the first town-wide food and drink offer­ing under the Sea Change banner.

For the 2023 edi­tion, Sea Change organ­is­ers have reduced the week­end tick­et price by 33%, in an attempt to make it as afford­able as pos­si­ble for every­body. An absolute essen­tial in the con­struc­tion of this year’s event has been to ensure that as many peo­ple can be involved as pos­si­ble. In the post-pan­dem­ic and mid-eco­nom­ic cri­sis of late win­ter 2023, sell­ing tick­ets for a week­end of music, arts and cul­ture has the poten­tial to fur­ther high­light the gulf between those that have and have not.

Founder Rupert Mor­ri­son explains, “When we first start­ed the event way back in 2015, we need­ed peo­ple to go with us, trust that the record shop could throw a par­ty and keep the town safe. We did, we built it, they came, it grew, and through thick and thin we’ve had the sup­port of an amaz­ing audi­ence of sup­port­ers. We know how fierce the cur­rent eco­nom­ic land­scape is and we feel strong­ly that mak­ing Sea Change a cel­e­bra­to­ry event in Totnes required as many of the local com­mu­ni­ty to feel engaged and inclined to participate”.

FESTIVAL INFORMATION

Tick­ets: avail­able online and at Drift Records www.seachangepresents.co.uk