THE BRIT FEST – DAY ONE- LIVE REVIEW AND PHOTO GALLERY – HAPPY MONDAYS

Today marked the first day of Brit Fest 2026 where we saw some amazing acts take to the stage in the first half of the day such as ‘The Farm’ who opened for the Happy Mondays back in April as well as legends like the Stereo Mc’s. As well as this we were greeted by the sun for the majority of the day which was an amazing feeling.

In the second half of the day from 6:30pm the lineup was stacked. We had ‘Peter Hook and the light’ first up on the main stage who co-founded joy division and new order – so of course they played some of these hits such as ‘Love will tear us apart’, ‘Disorder’ and the very fitting’World in motion.’ And wow what a band the stage presence to the music is perfection. They even had little details like amps that said “Salford Rules” and “Guitar Hero” and even on Peter Hooks shirt we saw the word ‘CHAOS’. I’ll definitely be catching this band again.

Then we ventured over to the little big top where we saw ‘Alright’ hit the stage, an emerging band from Blackpool that will definitely make it far.

Back over to the main stage where we had the legendary ‘Cast’ who opened for Oasis in 2025 who I was very excited to see again. Just before the band came on stage Jenny Powell and Mike Toolan were reading out some messages from the crowd and we even got a proposal!

This band is made up of ‘John Power’, ‘Liam Tyson’, ‘Keith O’Neill’ and ‘Jay Lewis’ and I’m sure you’ve heard of this English Brit pop band before. They definitely got the crowd excited for the renowned Happy Mondays to hit the stage. They played some of their iconic tunes such as ‘Fine Time’ (my personal favourite), ‘Alright’ and ‘Walkaway’ which most of the crowd knew the words too. There isn’t a better band you could put on stage before the Happy Mondays.

Then finally to close out the night we had the indie icons who everyone is here for ‘The Happy Mondays’. Who we also had the pleasure of capturing back in April and wow are we happy we got to see them again. The two frontmen ‘Bez’ and ‘Shaun Ryder’ have been in this band for a long time Shaun originally founded the band with his brother Paul Ryder who sadly passed away in 2022 but the band lives on sharing the music they all made back in the 80’s. Bez actually joined shortly after the band was formed as their dancer, percussionist and on-stage hype man and this certainly works – the crowd loves it. We of course heard songs such as ‘Step-on’ and ‘Kinky afro’. The crowd was a sea of neon with a crazy amount of Happy Mondays T shirts. The atmosphere for these guys as always was electric and everyone was having the time of their lives.