IO Earth launch Harmonix prog festival in 2017

By Natasha Scharf
( Prog )
published

Circuline, Telescope Road and Oktopus join IO Earth for prog event in Bilston

IO

IO Earth have announced that they’ll be launching a new one-day progressive music festival in the Midlands for 2017.

Harmonix Fest will take place on Sunday, June 25, 2017 at the Robin 2 in Bilston. The evening event will include performances from the Prog Award-nominated Circuline, as well as France’s Telescope Road and Birmingham trio Oktopus. IO Earth are confirmed as the headliners and it’ll be new vocalist Rosanna Lefevre’s UK debut with the band. The British proggers have even hinted that they might preview some new material from their fourth studio album, due out at the end of 2017.

IO Earth co-founder Dave Cureton says: “We are so proud to be able to put on this event and we are sure the IO Earth family are going to love it.”

Advance tickets are on sale now.

Harmonix Fest is the latest in a string of dates for IO Earth in 2017. The band has also been confirmed to play at Cruise To The Edge on February 7-11 and Prog Sud in France on May 27.

Natasha Scharf
Natasha Scharf
Deputy Editor, Prog

Contributing to Prog since the very first issue, writer and broadcaster Natasha Scharf was the magazine’s News Editor before she took up her current role of Deputy Editor, and has interviewed some of the best-known acts in the progressive music world from ELP, Yes and Marillion to Nightwish, Dream Theater and TesseracT. Starting young, she set up her first music fanzine in the late 80s and became a regular contributor to local newspapers and magazines over the next decade. The 00s would see her running the dark music magazine, Meltdown, as well as contributing to Metal Hammer, Classic Rock, Terrorizer and Artrocker. Author of music subculture books The Art Of Gothic and Worldwide Gothic, she’s since written album sleeve notes for Cherry Red, and also co-wrote Tarja Turunen’s memoirs, Singing In My Blood. Beyond the written word, Natasha has spent several decades as a club DJ, spinning tunes at aftershow parties for Metallica, Motörhead and Nine Inch Nails. She’s currently the only member of the Prog team to have appeared on the magazine’s cover.