MARIA REIS has been steadily creating a legacy that will undoubtedly endure in the portuguese songwriting canon for years to come. Co-founder of the Lisbon based Cafetra label-collective, Reis spent her teenage years honing her craft, particularly with her co-leading role on Pega Monstro with her sister Júlia Reis, with albums like 'Alfarroba' and 'Casa de Cima' on Upset The Rhythm and whose indefinite hiatus since 2018 opened the gateway for a prolific solo venture. 2019 saw the release of the celebrated 'Chove na Sala, Água nos Olhos', a definitive statement of Reis' almost casual gift of painting vivid and impressionistic portraits of everyday life, conveying all the anger, resignation and melancholic joy of moving on. Two years later, following a string of widely praised live appearances, Reis records the 'Flor da Urtiga' EP with assistance from Noah Lennox aka Panda Bear (Maria plays in Panda’s live band), a sweeter affair, shot through with witty irony, through layered acoustic guitars, lightweight percussion and joyful harmonies.

Maria Reis returned recently with a newfound maturity on 'Suspiro’. An attentive and sensitive observer of both intimate and surrounding spaces, Maria Reis continues to explore wordplay in her very personal manner, a poetic act as brutally honest as filled with imagery allusions, enchanting the mundane with lyricism. Touched by a resigned and dreamy melancholy, ‘Suspiro’ settles, for the most part, on electric and acoustic guitar lines, simple but expressive rhythms, floating vocal harmonies and a voice almost tangible in the way it conveys memorable hooks without fear of appearing both fragile and tenacious.

https://mariareis.bandcamp.com/album/suspiro

TRASH KIT are Ray Aggs (guitar, vocals), Rachel Horwood (drums, vocals) and Clémentine March (bass). Three deeply creative individuals united by a shared musicality that surges through their bodies, hearts and heads. Their songs, once succinct, patchwork post-punk numbers of an honest diary-like nature now tussle more with long-form songwriting, expeditious polyphony and cascades of sung-spoke vocals. Songs on their last album Horizon (Upset The Rhythm, 2019) have had their very fabric stretched into smart new shapes, allowing the band to run away with refrains and unlock the dancefloor. Although Trash Kit have their forebears in bands like Sleater Kinney, The Ex and The Raincoats, their sound is still very much their own take on facing forwards and relies as much on the naturalism of an internalised folk music as on their sincerity of vision.

2026 marks a new reinvigorated era for the band as they are joined by bassist Clémentine March. Breathing fresh life into their back catalogue on stage and jumping head first into sharing new material live, her spirited and responsive playing is once again steering the trio into new, expansive territory. They can’t wait to get back on the road to light up DIY venues across the the UK with what promises to be an energetic and joyous experience for the band and the audience alike.

https://upsettherhythm.bandcamp.com/album/horizon

DOG CHOCOLATE are a post-pop-"pencil case" punk band, much indebted to lasting friendship. 15 years into their journey as a band, and somehow continuing after the upheaval and weirdness since the virus, they’ll probably still exist in some form when we’ve all been replaced by cyborgs. Their most recent album “So Inspired, So Done In” is Dog Chocolate’s most cohesive yet. Tying together everything that came before, with repeated themes of work, city life, escapism into nature and the creative process, often looking at minutiae to express big ideas. Musically they’re a loud, multicoloured scribble of noise, often eschewing choruses to find the next melodic nugget that connects the puzzle pieces. The live experience is part cathartic explosion, part group therapy, using sincerity and buffoonery in equal measures to try and get a rise or make a connection.

https://upsettherhythm.bandcamp.com/album/so-inspired-so-done-in

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