Name: Rats on Rafts
Start: 2025-02-23T19:30:00+00:00
Location: 13 Turner Street, CT11 8NJ Ramsgate, United Kingdom

Following their superb support slot in 2023, opening up for The Chills, we’re pleased to welcome back Rats on Rafts for a headline show!
The Netherlands outfit refuse to stand still: starting first as hungry punk rock upstarts, then as fiery analogue recording dogmatists, and psych-rock protagonists. Instead of moving along with these volatile currents, Rats on Rafts stubbornly stand their ground in the subterranean hollows where their creativity always seems to thrive…
“Rotterdam awkwardists churn underground noise with bracing warped pop appeal” – MOJO
Following the release of second album ‘Tape Hiss’ in October 2015, Rats On Rafts returned in 2016 with new single ‘Some Velvet Morning’. In 2016 the band released a collaborative album with Dutch underground punk / brass ensemble De Kift – a playful re-visioning of each other’s music. The two bands locked themselves up for a month to record a completely analogue album. Known for their explosive live performances, they have toured across Europe and performed at festivals including Glastonbury, Eurosonic and Le Guess Who, including supports with Pere Ubu.
In 2019 they joined Franz Ferdinand on tour in Japan, playing to huge arenas across the country. 2021 saw the band release their third album ‘Excerpts From Chapter 3’. Initially a concept set, it subsumed itself and, in doing so, became a concept piece in its own right; a fragmented journey into the id punctuated with rhythmic kabuki modal mood swings, thunderstorms and digital beeps reminding that time is ticking – something of an aside in this analogue recorded set.
In 2022 they revisited the themes with ‘Visions Of Chapter 3’ including newly added B-side ‘Osaka’ and a second disc of unreleased live music recorded at Tivoli Vrendenburg as part of an interdisciplinary music film. Each song spins a yarn; there are plagues, dreams, wind and fire, ‘mythical’ characters, and the search for the secret government warehouse.
“Rats On Rafts have the confidence to ditch convention and the talent to pull it off. Long feted as a visceral, enigmatic live band, they’ve captured some of that vitality in these eight songs” – The Quietus
“A huge leap that sees them create a modern post-punk psych near-masterpiece” – Louder than War