Name: MANCHESTER FOLK HORROR VIII
Start: 2026-02-07T12:00:00+00:00
Location: 14-16 Faraday Street, M1 1BE Manchester, United Kingdom

Already, Manchester Folk Horror 8 is upon us. Whilst the internet continues to debase ideas which turn us on for an a minute or a moment , we are forced to dig ever deeper to find what it is we seek. To be occult means to hide or conceal. It seems there are very good reasons for that, not least the dynamics of cringe limbo. So yes, we indeed, dig deeper, reaching for something increasingly unknowable, and yet all the more enticing for that.
“Beauty is the beginning of terror” is a more or less a quote from Rainer Maria Rilke’s Poem, The First Elegy. To gain a sense of it:
Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the Angels’
Orders? and even if one of them pressed me
suddenly to his heart: I’d be consumed
in his more potent being. For beauty is nothing
but the beginning of terror, which we can still barely endure,
and while we stand in wonder it coolly disdains
to destroy us. Every Angel is terrifying.
Why should this be so? Certainly it seems, in a more prosaic manner, that beauty is disdained in the arts. What is important to the various bodies which determine the art economy, that is to say, the worth of art, is not that the work be beautiful, but rather that it mean something…and not only that it mean something, but that it mean something very particular; that it tell the story of a chosen history in its recording and in the minds of the appreciators and connoisseurs who are both propagator and consumer.
Every year I make the same distinction regarding Folk and Horror. That folk is tradition, an old truth, often forgotten…and that horror arises from the traumatic reunion with the forgotten. Is it too much of a stretch to place beauty in this category? No. We argue there is something of beauty which robs us of power; which makes a rude mockery of our utilitarian rationalisations. Beauty is not the merely cosmetic, but the apprehension of cosmic rightness. A hinted at meaning so overwhelming in its extra human authority, that it should annihilate us utterly were it to notice us, as we notice it.
It is the suggestion of the Absolute. “Be not afraid”, says the angel, but they are surely laughing in the awful fashion of angels because they must know that we have no choice. All at once our suspicions regarding the order of things are proven right, even as we are rendered into ash at the moment of revelation. Think of the death of Semele, mother of Dionysus, as when tricked into demanding Zeus reveal his true form, was consumed by lightning. Or the strange protagonist of Machen’s The White People who falls into a beautiful and horrible truth. The line, “I have always believed Wonder is of the soul”, finishes that story. Beauty, likewise, is found there and with it come all the hosts of heaven and all the hosts of hell.
FOUNDLING is an evolution of Erin Lang’s musical projects ‘Erin Lang & The Foundlings’ and ‘Feral & Stray’. These projects have been blessed with the creative input of a collective of incredibly talented visual collaborators and musicians.
David Georgos (LOCOTO, MEMUM) and Erin Lang have been making music together since 2013. David plays synths and creates atmospheres on ‘Fault Lines’ and the latest release ‘Equilibria’, Erin contributes guest vocals on the song Aalto on Memum’s album ‘Confidence’.
Along with Peter Handson on saxophone and flute, Dino Karlis on drums, and Samuel Hall on percussion, this makes up the European touring linup of Foundling. They will be taking us upon a profoundly liminal journey.

Underneath the Earth is the debut album from CHIMEHOURS; a hauntological music project for the dislocated present day. Taking inspiration from Max Porter’s novel Lanny, the album digs into themes of nature, myth and community, with an edge of folk-horror. Drones, drums and gritty guitars are juxtaposed with woodwind, strings and ethereal song. The album takes musical influence from the likes of Liz Fraser, Broadcast, Sun O)))), Beth Gibbons, Bibio and Johan Johansson, and atmospheric cues from The Wickerman, The Fog, and Enys Men.
Chimehours is a collaboration between beck goldsmith and jon dix. The pair have previously performed in bands together and composed music for award-winning film and television. They conjured up this foray into cinematic, horror-flecked contemporary-folk to explore their love of the supernatural and the other-than-human. Chimehours raid the vaults of 70s cinema and trad folk soundscapes to riff on contemporary anxieties and ecological yearning. The result is a collection of all things earthy, gorgeous and grotesque.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/18OkGUCAP7b6sbxO03BhYy3fR7fMy_3iP/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=115688569080569517044&rtpof=true&sd=true
JOSHUA ARNOLD AND THERINE are a folk duo from the North West, consisting of multi-instrumentalist Joshua Arnold and vocalist Therine. They perform traditional folk music of the British Isles showcasing themes of the dark and macabre blended with elements of drone and noise music alongside original drone folk pieces and historically accurate charms and prayers from their first album.

ZOLATEC creates music that is both intimate and spiritual, exploring themes of heartbreak, identity, and existential drift through raw and immersive performance.
Growing up in Leicester to South Asian and Caribbean parents, Zolatec played steelpan for most of her life. It wasn’t until the COVID lockdown that she first ventured into electronic music, opening up a new direction in her sound.
Drawing from trip hop, breakcore & witch house, her music production style has evolved into a diasporic fusion of breakbeats, shoegaze textures, and experimental sound design – anchored by ethereal vocals and live steelpan.
She aspires to gift her sound to the grassroots community and create meaningful connections through music.

THE DARK ARTS RESEARCH KOLLECTIVE CORDIALLY ANNOUNCES: MUSIC OF THE ULTRATERRESTRIALS. Pray attend, dear listener, to a most singular entertainment. From the curious archives of Mr. Doug Skinner’s Music of Elsewhere is drawn a selection of airs and strains, reputedly heard amidst the haunts of beings not of our common sphere—those sprites and sylvan folk, piskies and trolls, kelpies and banshees, whose legends have long beguiled the imagination. These melodies, once whispered in glen and hollow, are here presented anew, refracted through the glass of experimental art, and rendered for your auditory delight. Come, partake of this rare occasion, wherein the harmonies of the unseen shall mingle with the inventions of modern fancy.
The DⱯRK Ensemble features,
Christopher Gladwin, an interdisciplinary artist and musician whose work spans electronic music, sound art, and performance. Since 1999, he has produced, published, and performed internationally under projects including Team Doyobi, The Wyrding Module, and ANZAK. His practice has featured at contemporary arts events and galleries such as the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts, Manchester City Gallery, the Post-War Festival of Art & Culture in Iraq, New Moves International, and Kinetica Art Fair. Gladwin’s current research explores the intersections of sound, technology, and Occulture—subverting modernity and challenging rationalist paradigms. His work brings together esoteric ontologies, ritual, and occultism with electronics, the scientific imaginary, and dance music culture, creating hybrid forms that question dominant narratives and evoke alternative ways of knowing.
Katie Chatburn is a composer, sound artist and orchestral arranger with an interest in boundary crossing musical collaborations. In 2017 she founded Ignition Orchestra and has since conducted and arranged for projects that bridge classical and other musical forms, including starting the Garage Classical project with DJ Spoony. She has worked as an orchestral arranger for artists including Paloma Faith, The Sugababes, Aloe Blacc, Neil Hannon, Shaznay Lewis, The Streets, Katy B, Ayanna Witter-Johnson and Lady Blackbird and worked for orchestras including Chineke Orchestra, The BBC Philharmonic and the BBC Concert Orchestra. Alongside composing for various TV and film commissions, Katie is developing an original voice as a sound artist and working towards a PhD at MMU. Her focus is on the development of creative sound installations and interventions that explore the relational potential of the city soundscape.

SONGS OF GREEN PHEASANT is a true rarity, an emanation of its own subject and a perfect encapsulation of our theme.
“A schoolteacher from Oughtibridge, a residential village on the outskirts of Sheffield, Duncan Sumpner has released a string of records under the name, Songs Of Green Pheasant, without ever quite stepping into the light. The project’s origin story speaks volumes about his elusive approach. A demo that Sumpner sent to Fat Cat in 2002 became a fixture on the label’s office stereo. But when they decided to get in contact to offer him a record deal, the email bounced back, and it took them years to track him down. Unhurried, unshowy, utterly unconcerned with attention: all it asks from us is to still our brains, and simply listen.” UNCUT
“…exists somewhere in that wide open space between folk, psychedelia, post-rock, dream pop, and experimental music, albeit with a homespun quality that avoids genre clichés.” OPUS
Songs Of Green Pheasant is a true rarity, an emanation of its own subject and a perfect encapsulation of our theme.

THE MANIFESTATION GROUP are concerned with demonstrating and investigating the phenomena of songs as distinct, agential entities. They have continued to develop their studies, having spent time uncovering the phenomenology of a possibly fictional 60s folk band, The Lesley & Charles Quartet, to be presented in the year’s first quarter.

CHELSEA HARE is Tom Hollingworth and we consider him to be amongst the top three or four musicians we have ever had the joy to encounter. He remains the only musician to have played the Manchester Folk Horror event on every year of its existence “Disarming, uncanny moments of theatricality sit comfortably alongside more downbeat moments of introspection. Tom’s incredibly funny and poetic lyrics provide a tremendous thread through the blizzard of fairly schizophrenic musical styles… but Tom’s voice is unmistakably his own.” NARC magazine

CHERMANSOG Exploring the ties between the ancient and the modern, the organic and synthetic, from the open landscapes of Yorkshire to the dark enclosed clubs of Manchester. Chermansog draws from magic and traditional English folk music, blended with influences from dance, metal and noise.

CHARLOTTE CLEGG (MSc, MBACP) is a psychotherapist, an unapologetic hedonist, and an absolute nightmare.
Proudly and often defiantly Northern, whose hobbies include pole dancing, being authentic and outspoken in the face of The Establishment and collecting curiosities and taxidermy, she will be taking us on an exploration of the psychological reasons why we crave folk horror, in all forms, across civilizations in all corners of the globe.

THORN WYCH sings in tongues and plays free form improvised devotional music using instruments purposefully crafted from Sacred tree branches and other imbued objects. These are fed through a chain of lofi effects machines, creating atavistic hymns and hypnotic dances, in praise of our Supreme Mother, Empress of Essence, The Holy Spirit Asherah. Hers is the breath that moves through all things and the light that remembers itself in us.
Thorn Wych’s debut album “Aesthesis” was released on the label Hoodfaire in November 2024.
“sounds and song that pull post-industrial and traditional music into a ghostly, mesmerising fog that’s wholly unique. ”
– World of Echo
https://hoodfaire1.bandcamp.com/album/aesthesis

LEUCOTOME: Omnioscillating industrifolk fey femme cult of the apocalypto-medieval era.

TOOT is an electronic noise/drone artist from Levenshulme. His work describes fragments of half-forgotten history and haunted urban crevices, through a filter of everyday life in the post industrial north.

VIVEKA GOYANES says about her work “From textile art to editorial publishing or photography, creativity has always served as a reflection of a lifelong search in which the artistic act represents a transformation, not just from a physical perspective through symbolic art pieces, but also from an emotional and spiritual one.
My idea of creation can be described as alchemical, seeking a betterment of the environment and a correspondence and balance between the inner and outer worlds, the physical and the psychological, the past and the present and the self and the community. Manifesting change is the ultimate goal.”

OLIVER BRIDGES a filmmaker based in Liverpool and Edinburgh, presents IRREDUCIBLE MOTHER

DAVID BIRCHALL David Birchall a guitarist and organiser living in Manchester, UK. He was born in Leicester and went to a comprehensive school built on top of an Anglo Saxon cemetery.
He has performed in the UK, Europe, Russia, Palestine, USA & Japan. His work has been broadcast on BBC Radio 3, BBC Radio 6 Music, SWR in Germany, WFMU in the US & ABC in Australia.
He is notorious in The Peer Hat for organising the monthly Curious Ear series for improvised music which he co-founded with Andrew Cheetham.
He’s still convinced the practical musical experiences of free improvisation and consensus/dialogue social forms it models offer us one of the best ways through all this
For Folk Horror Fest he will be performing a special live soundtrack to his Derek Jarman inspired film cycle “Journeys to Peak District Stone Circles”

HEDGEBOUND CERAMICS https://hedgeboundengland.co.uk/pages/about-us

MEGAN BRIERLEY artist based in Salford

SIMON NUNN a film-maker from Norwich, presents THE GROVE

SAM PAY presents his film Nerualgia

MADELINE YOUNG presents stunning and disturbing tapestries that are as primordially profane, as they are sublimely beautiful.

With thanks to the Weird Studies Podcast, for whom an idle listen one afternoon, inspired this particular iteration of the Manchester Folk Horror Festival.
GROUND FLOOR
Introduction/welcome/opening the way 12 00-12 20
TooT 12 30 -13 00
Leucotome 13 15-13 45
Thorny Wych 14 00-14 30
Charlotte Clegg MSc MBAP 14 45-15 30
Chermansog15 45-16 15
Song Of Green Pheasant16 30-17 00
Delta Mono 17 15-17 45
DVK 18 00-18 45
Joshua Arnold & Therine 19 00-19 45
Zolatec 20 00-20 30
Chimehours 20 45 21 30
Foundling 21 45 22 45
The Manifestation Group 23 00+