“Bristol gave us love, and it gave us the patience to make mistakes”This article contains affiliate links, we will receive a commission on any sales we generate from it. Learn more
Joe Talbot of Idles performs during their headline set on the Other Stage during day three of Glastonbury Festival 2024 (Image: Leon Neal/Getty Images)
They are the biggest act to come out of Bristol since the 1990s, and later this summer, Idles will headline and host not one, but two homecoming gigs in front of 15,000 people in Queen Square.
The historic square in the heart of the Old City regularly hosts concerts and events like the Harbour Festival, but this is the first time a major one-off music event is being held there since the famous 2015 Arcadia show saw a giant spider produce pumping dance music.
The summer shows are billed as a Block Party, with the Bristol-based band bringing in a stellar line-up of their favourite bands and acts, and Idles frontman Joe Talbot said he’s delighted to create such a huge event for Bristol.
He told Bristol Live he remembered the Arcadia show, and jumped at the chance to play Queen Square. “For us, it was about doing something special,” he said.
That area of the city helped form Idles – band members worked in the Golden Lion and the Old Duke, and they once tried to put on a ‘block party’ music festival in nearby King Street. Veterans of the city’s free party scene after he moved to Bristol from Devon, Joe said he’s pleased to add to Bristol’s musical scene.
“It was always just an amazing time, and we’re always about that,” he said. “It just makes sense to do something in the city, with our people, for our people. We’re very grateful – it’s gonna be amazing,” he added.
“It’s the first time we’ve been able to put on a proper big big, or two, gigs,” he said. The event will be over two nights with different support acts ahead of two Idles headliner sets. “In Bristol we wanted to kind of spread it out and show what and where our influences come from, and who’s doing it at the moment that we love,” Joe said.
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“Luckily, we’ve got some bands from the Bristol scene. It’s just like being able to spread what we love more than just a bunch of dudes with guitars. Obviously, we have guitar bands, but we wanted it to be more than that.
“We just wanted to bring some good, good music and good love into our city. And I think we’ve done it well. I’m very excited. I managed, for once, to be able to get what I wanted within reason. I couldn’t be more happy with the line-up. I think it’s a good example of what we love and where we come from,” he added.
There are still tickets available from Ticketmaster and SeeTickets for the Queen Square gigs, priced at £57 for either of the two nights, or at £114.40 for a weekend ticket if you want to go to both. Alternatively, resale site viagogo has tickets listed, but these start from £65 a ticket, and you don’t have the option to buy a two-day pass.
It’s now eight years since Idles burst onto the British music scene with their debut album Brutalism in 2017, and the follow-up Joy As An Act Of Resistance in 2018 increased their profile significantly. But Idles were already ‘Bristol Famous’, having formed in the city way back in 2009. Honing their sound, attitude and stagecraft over many years of gigging in and around the city built up a strong devoted following.
So, for Joe Talbot, the idea of having gone from playing gigs in front of less than 50 people just a stone’s throw away from Queen Square where up to 30,000 people will watch them over two nights, doesn’t seem odd. It hasn’t been an overnight, meteoric rise. Idles have grafted hard for years for this moment.
“It’s not weird, to be honest, no,” he said. “We haven’t stopped and we’ve been working on ourselves and we’ve been making music continuously. We work from the ground level up, and we made sure that we had a hand into everything we put our name to,” he said.
IDLES at The Downs in 2021(Image: PA)
There’s always been a hard-working, organic, community feel to Idles. “I designed our posters. I made sure everything was done right. We always remember sound engineer’s name. We turn up on time or early, and we make sure that when we do something, and the music and the bands we’re surrounded by, is stuff that we’re in love with, otherwise, we don’t do it,” he said.
“I’m not saying we haven’t made mistakes on the way, but when you work hard and you get opportunities and you seize those, and you work from a place of gratitude, and you know how lucky you are, so you keep up that momentum, you often get to places that you plan for, as opposed to stuff falling on your lap because you’re in the right place at the right time,” he added.
“I’m not saying we haven’t been lucky on the way. But, none of this seems like a surprise to me. It’s what you work towards. I’m not saying that if you work hard, you will get this – I’m definitely not saying that.
“But everything that I’ve done, for the past 15 years of my life, has had a plan to it, and I’ve stuck to my plan, and I’ve learnt my lessons, and I’ve learned from the people around me, and I’ve listened when people gave me good advice, and I’ve ignored the p****s,” he added.
‘We would be nothing without Bristol’
The prospect of being at the heart of another huge music moment for Bristol’s musical history is a motivation for Joe in pulling together the event, although he describes what’s planned as being an Idles event, rather than a ‘very Bristol event’.
“I want it to be an Idles event. It’s an Idles gig, right?” he said. “Bristol built us. And that’s not something that a lot of bands would admit from Bristol, I think. But we would be nothing without Bristol.
“Bristol gave us love, and it gave us the patience to make mistakes, to do bad shows, to learn from that, and to grow. And I think Bristol’s amazing at that. It has a sense of forgiveness and a sense of celebration. All the bands we came up with, none of them sounded the same. There wasn’t a theme. There was a lot of bands at the time when we started out, and they were all supporting each other. And we’re very grateful for that,” he said.
With commercial and live success arriving in the late 2010s – the band’s third album Ultra Mono went to number one in 2020, as did their fifth, Tangk, last year – Joe said he never felt the need or desire to do what a lot of Bristol music acts feel they have to do, either to make it big in the first place or after their first success, and move to London.
IDLES will headline the two-night event in August at Queen Square.(Image: REHM GABI)
“I don’t,” he said, matter-of-factly. “I don’t. I’ve always been in love with Bristol. I wouldn’t need, and still don’t need, to leave. I’ve got a huge privilege of being able to travel the world for my job, and I get to come back to my favourite place with my favourite people. I love it.
“There is easier opportunity in London because that is where that conglomerate lies, but…I don’t know – I’m Bristolian,” he added.
“I think what Bristol is good at is just welcoming people from everywhere with open arms, having a good party, and celebrating the new and the different – I think that’s what Bristol’s amazing at,” he said.
“It was a port and it’s got a very dark history. What’s come from the ashes, as it said in Stokes Croft, is the beauty. And I’m very f***ing pleased to come from there, and I’m very glad I live there now,” he added.
One of the elements of the Queen Square two-nighter is that local businesses will benefit, something Joe said he was keen to see.
“We want to give back to the city, but also highlight, beyond the city, in the city,” he said. “I think the best way to do that is to make sure all the business is going back into the city. That’s what I want. I want all the businesses to be local, and I want people to come from wherever and celebrate Bristol.
Idles release their fifth studio album Tangk in 2024(Image: Daniel Topete)
“Scorpio, the promoters, have been working very hard in making sure that the environmental impact of our show is minimal, and they have to a very amazing degree,” he added.
“There’s very little impact on the environment – it’s all run on batteries, the backup batteries, it’s off-grid, which means it’s very environmentally friendly. We’re doing lots of recycling and everything’s basically in place to make sure it’s less impactive than any other event,” he added.
Idles play Queen Square on Friday, August 1 and Saturday, August 2. Tickets are available from Ticketmaster and SeeTickets