Live Review + Gallery | Sŵn Festival 2026

Sŵn Festival 2026

Multiple Venues, Cardiff

15th-17th October

Photography by Aron Weston and Anna Hatfield

George Ward

Freelance journalist and online editor for CLUNK. Can be found out and about in Bristol, finding cheap records or having a pint on King Street.

Anna Hatfield

Freelance photographer, videographer, and journalist. Specialising in all things music and will most likely be found in a photo pit somewhere muttering about lighting conditions

We return to Cardiff for Sŵn 2026, a growing festival celebrating the city’s independent venues and the country’s independent artists

Last weekend, Sŵn Festival returned to Cardiff, bringing with it some of the UK’s most exciting new bands, as well as some international guests too. Taking place across Cardiff’s many small venues, the festival is an underrated but rapidly growing event, with the weekend completely sold out.

The first thing you’ll notice once you start exploring Sŵn Festival is just how busy it truly is. It’s not that the streets of Cardiff are packed wall-to-wall, with the city instead maintaining an exciting but manageable buzz. Instead, it’s the unavoidable fact that many of these venues are very small. While this can prove quite frustrating for the first few sets you miss due to rooms reaching capacity, with some careful planning and willingness to arrive rather early to your must-see sets, you begin to get into the swing of things, secretly feeling quite smug as you’re packed into each sweaty venue.

This is, in a way, what makes Sŵn so special; with so many artists packed into Cardiff’s relatively small city centre, the festival has become creative, utilising every space, from the basement of Jacob’s Antiques to the tiny upstairs room of Tiny Rebel to the gorgeous St. John’s Church. Though larger venues like Tramshed may have had better sound and more room to breathe, you can’t fault Sŵn for not making the most of every inch of Cardiff’s music scene.

Many of these venues can be found on Womanby Street, including the legendary Clwb Ifor Bach, where we caught Personal Trainer, a couple hours before our interview with the band. Hailing from The Netherlands and at the start of their UK tour, the band were a surprise highlight, setting the bar extremely high for our weekend. Personal Trainer have such a likeable energy to them, not simply from their polite and grateful chat throughout the show, but also from their every charming songwriting and joyful performance style. Just as you pin down their sound, a million other influences jump out, and I found myself reminded of Figure 8-era Elliott Smith, Vampire Weekend and Jeff Rosenstock, all within minutes of each other.

It wouldn’t be Sŵn Festival without discovering some local Welsh talent and we found plenty upstairs in O’Neill’s. When we stumbled into Dewin’s set, we didn’t know quite what to expect, as we found ourselves faced with an incredibly young group of musicians, all crammed together on stage and dressed in raincoats. Dewin made the most of all of its 9 members, playing a wonderfully whimsical set entirely in Welsh, including the chat between tracks. Later, Tag Haf Heb Drigolyn packed themselves in too, playing a much catchier and more chaotic set than their more experimental recorded material might suggest.

Though there was certainly a lot of indie rock over the weekend, there was plenty to dance to also. Bathing Suits closed out Friday night at Canopi, channelling Model/Actriz with their clash of noise rock and dance music in the sexiest set of the festival, as well as Good Health, Good Wealth‘s basement set on Saturday, just one day after the release of their new album ‘The Disco Never Ends’.

With all the buzz around them recently, we had to catch a bit of Cowboy Hunters before we chatted to them later that night. They certainly didn’t disappoint. Their stage presence is somehow both nonchalant, comedic, and energetic, and had the whole room captivated. With punchy vocals, loud driving bass, and a splash of charisma, it’s no wonder this band has become an overnight sensation.

Amidst all the noise, there were a few special moments of quiet. After a gorgeous folk set from Dermot Henry to put us in the mood, we headed over to Dove Ellis in Tramshed; following his performance at Green Man this year, he was firmly one of our most anticipated acts of the weekend. It’s rare to see someone so early in their career and be entirely certain that they will be a star, but with Dove Ellis, it’s difficult to argue with.

Whether stood centre stage with his electric guitar, or off to the side on his upright piano, Dove is a master at holding your attention. Somehow just as comfortable belting out choruses as he is delicately hitting heavenly falsetto notes, Ellis‘s voice is unmatched in the current indie scene and we’re sure that with slightly more ambitious songwriting, he is set to be an absolutely huge name.

Throughout the weekend, we have to admit that the audience could sometimes be a little calm for our tastes, with a few sets begging for more lively fans. However, for Westside Cowboy, our final set of the festival, we’re happy to report that we would not have rather been anywhere else in the world than right in the middle of that crowd, surrounded by fellow fans, screaming the words back at the band.

For a band with more buzz than anyone would know what to do with, Westside Cowboy somehow deserve every bit of it. Every member truly puts all of themselves into every performance, making every single one feel like an incredibly special, personal moment for the fans. The band played most of their debut album, with each and every track heightened a thousand times, making so much more sense on stage than in the studio.

However, it is still the EP tracks that go the hardest: ‘Strange Taxidermy‘ is transformed in its heavier form, forming the set’s emotional core, while hearing ‘I’ve Never Met Anyone I Thought I Could Really Love’ live solidifies it as one of the decades best indie rock songs. We’re sure some of you are a bit tired of hearing about them but please, if you haven’t seen them live at least once, let Westside Cowboy convince you that they’re worth your time.