Five of the best at Electric Fields festival

Electric Fields comes to the grounds of Drumlanrig Castle in Scotland for its third installment between Friday 26th and Saturday 27th August. The beautiful location and dovetails with a homegrown feel and boutique camping aplenty, creating one of the UK's rapidly growing delights. 

The musical talent on display isn't bad either, the Electric Fields line up is exemplary, with Everything Everything, The Sugarhill Hang and Denis Sulta making things eclectic and electric. Our writers have picked five acts who we think are simply unmissable for this year's event.

Public Service Broadcasting

Find Public Service Broadcasting tickets

There's few records this writer has turned to so frequently in the last 18 months than Public Service Broadcasting's gorgeous The Race for Space.

The LP manages to capture the awe, excitement and tragedy that accompanied the lust of the USA and the USSR's forages beyond our planet in the fifties and sixties across nine sublime tracks, a high watermark of their recordings which have transformed samples from 20th century news broadcasts into thought provoking pieces of music.

Usually great music makes for great performance. Their live shows have consistently been audio-visual treats, so expect the endearing charm of their releases to be a high-point of Electric Fields. 

Jimmy Coultas

Erol Alkan

Find Erol Alkan tickets

The Phantasy Records boss has been wowing clubbers for over 20 years, and is still a standout addition to any club or festival line up, as well suited to the bigger outdoor stages as he is the smaller intimate venues. Expect a whirlwind set through acid, house and techno sounds, plus a fair few new releases.

Erol Alkan has also been working under his Beyond The Wizard's Sleeve project with Richard Norris as of late, offering up psychedelic sounds and more genre-blurring musical goodness. Watching him in action is a true masterclass.

Becca Frankland

The Charlatans

Find The Charlatans tickets

While he's not traversing the globe on an eternal quest for vinyl (read bout this in his epic new Vinyl Adventures from Istanbul to San Francisco book), Tim Burgess is also fast becoming the prince of festival season with his Tim Peaks cafe making appearances at Kendal Calling, Festival No. 6 and now Electric Fields.

Aside from providing top quality brews, Burgess' indie rock outfit, the Charlatans will be performing live as Friday's headline act and have 12 studio albums to dip into that span way back to 1990's Some Friendly. Their groovy rock vibe will most likely mean that you'll want something stronger than tea in your mug however.

Henry Lewis 

Field Music 

Find Field Music tickets

Pardon the obvious, but there's a connection between Electric Fields and Field Music. The 'electric' part is more our point of focus, for the kinetic energy they create with their hunky-dory, head jolting art-rock that's both funky and melodic in substance.

The pair released their seventh album Commontime earlier this year, a record that sways with eighties vigour and splashes oil on the cranky hips. Sold yet? Field Music bring good times to your Saturday at the festival. 

Ben Smith

Wild Beasts

Find Wild Beasts tickets

Akin to their name, the band roam more primal these days with their most recent record Boy King. By far their biggest and boldest to date, the album thrusts with neon-lighted masculinity, which should transfer to a thrilling live performance. 

The musings of their past albums are done away with for audacious electro-rock, but it's not as in-you-face as the Ultimate Warrior provoking cover might suggest.

Wild Beasts maintain the majestic appeal they've always had, only with chunkier drum arrangements and retro sounding synths thrown in the mix. They could just be the must-see live band of the year. 

Ben Smith  

Get Electric Fields festival tickets from the box below.

More like this? Read Skiddle Sound of 2017 Spotify Playlist.

Tickets are no longer available for this event