About SFTOC | Sounds from the Other City festival – Sounds From The Other City
Salford's festival of new music & art • 4 May 2025

Created for music lovers by music lovers.

Sounds From The Other City has been a firm underground favourite since 2005; delivering a unique annual event that champions local promoters and celebrates the off-kilter beauty of Salford, the oft-overlooked ‘other city’ to Manchester.

A creative scene is constantly moving and with a line-up booked by a revolving collective of promoters, Sounds has served as an annual snapshot of the Greater Manchester scene, taking place in the pubs, churches, studios, warehouses and ‘in-between’ spaces of Chapel Street.

SFTOC was created with two main aims in mind:

Firstly, to celebrate and foreground the work of independent promoters in Salford and Manchester, shining a light on the people who work tirelessly to bring new music and artists to public attention, often with little recognition of that invaluable role they play.

Secondly, to draw attention to the off-kilter beauty of Salford, the often overlooked ‘other city’ to Manchester, through embedding live music and art everywhere, from the doctors surgery to churches, pubs and community centres.

And out of these roots has grown this curiosity of a festival, one that is co-designed by our fellow promotors and audience and has become synonymous with its community, ultimately becoming a celebration of the most exciting emerging names in music.

Over the years we’ve hosted early-day performances from artists as diverse as James Ferraro, Marina, Anz, Slowthai, GoGo Penguin right through to 2017’s Mercury Music Prize winner Sampha, 2018 BBC Sound of 2018 nominee IAMDDB and 2019 and 2021 Mercury Music Prize nominees, Black Midi and Hannah Peel, respectively

Enthusiastically supported by:

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