Preview: Chaos Theory Festival 2025 – 15 Years Of Chaos… And Noise

2025 is set to be a seminal year for a lot of heavy music lovers. Whether it is related to Black Sabbath’s last-ever hurrah in Birmingham’s Villa Park in July (well, until Sharon pulls out another excuse, I guess – yes, I’m salty about the ‘guest performers’ list but that’s just my sassy little opinion) or the 30th anniversary of the best Faith No More album, King For A Day… Fool For A Lifetime, or even the never-ending list of stacked line-ups for this year’s festival season, I can confidently say that we are in for the hoot of the decade.

That being said, one festival, in particular, has put the extra effort to really wow those who will be gallivanting in Walthamstow on Saturday, 1st March and/or in Camden the following Saturday, 8th March for the 15th Anniversary of the Chaos Theory Festival. To say that I am excited is an understatement, but my job is to convince you to join the party, so let me do that to the best of my abilities.

Let’s start with the first part of this anniversary edition, which will take place in the North-Eastern London borough of Walthamstow. If you grew up in the ‘90s like I did, you know why this part of London was the centre of attention during the Boy Band era, but I’m sorry to announce that we will not see a surprise reunion of East 17 at the Signature Brew Blackhorse Road. I know, I know, we all wanted to mosh on House Of Love. Still, there will be plenty of incredible London-based acts to make up for it, such as For Breakfast (a dream-pop/post-rock band I’ve been curious about for a while), psych-heavy rockers Thee Alcoholics and the mighty Sly & The Family Drone whose free-jazz/noise-rock music cannot be described in words found in a thesaurus because you just have to be there to get it.

The second part will take place at a more familiar place for heavy noise enthusiasts, The Underworld, in Camden, for more doomy and hardcore performances but still making a lot of space for DIY, experimentation and chaos. Now, instead of giving you a heads-up on what band you must watch, I will tell you about the various local scenes that will be represented over two glorious Saturdays, so you can make up your own mind.

As you may know, I left my native Parisian banlieue for Brighton in January 2016 and have been passionate about the Brighton scene ever since. So obviously, I have to tell you about CLT DRP (pronounced clit-drip) and Codex Serafini. The former has been going strong these past couple of years and gained a massive following around the British hardcore scene with their smart mix of d-beat, noise and pop-punk whereas the latter surprised many last year when they played at ArcTanGent’s Bixler Stage with their futurist proto-kraut infused psychedelic sounds.

Moving further west, we got Bristol – also having a strong contingent – coming our way to wow us with some delicious artsy and super cool post-rock (Sans Froid and Peach on Day One) and with the incredibly heavy post-metal band Svalbard on Day Two. Then, you just go a little further north to the Shropshire Hills where Haress is based. If you do not know them, don’t worry, you have plenty of time to listen to their blues folk-rock music before their set on Day One, as they will also do a set with the experimental noise collective Ukaea the same day.

Let’s continue up norf’ with Manchester, where the representation will come from Hesska, a visual artist who will do a DJ set at the very end of Day One, so you might not want to miss that. After going all the way towards Yorkshire, take a little break in Leeds with their best export thus far in the name of Hundred Year Old Man, who also blew the minds of many ArcTanGent fans last summer (and I include myself in it).

Then you continue going southwards to East Midlands and appreciate what Nottingham has to offer with both Aja Ireland (industrial tech noise) on Day One and Underdark (blackened doom with twinges of post-metal) before going all the way down to the Big Smoke with bands like Five The Hierophant (avant-garde jazz black metal), Shooting Daggers (’90s queercore garage punk) and Morag Tong (heavy psych doom) on Day Two.

There is so much heart and dedication within the whole team and you can tell that they really want us to celebrate this fantastic milestone with them. There are plenty of options to choose from and the fact that you won’t have to run from venue to venue to see them all makes it even more exciting. I don’t know for you but, it’s against my totally-not-at-all made-up religion to refuse birthday cake so, shall I save you a piece?

Grab your ticket for either or both Saturdays over on Dice FM.

Scribed by: Nessie Spencer