Review: Sunday at Winter's End 2026 with Tyketto, These Wicked Rivers and more

Of the various ways to be revived after a late Saturday night, the short, sharp shock treatment is among the best. That’s exactly where modern metal battle-station Straight for the Sun come in. The Midlands outfit effectively offer a cold shower of well marshalled riffs and angry hooks. Typical is ‘Villains’, a raging mass of six-string, while ‘Fall Away’ provides a contrastingly emotive tribute to singer Callum Green’s late father.

“I can die happy now that I’ve been introduced by Ian Danter,” says evidently-easily-pleased Blue Nation frontman Neil Murdoch. We’re in safe hands from the get-go, the power trio’s hilarious onstage banter bettered only by their hulking blues riffs and knack with tunesmithery. There’s a flash of Bad Company in ‘Hand Me Down’, and if new song ‘Reach for the Sky’ is typical, the Birmingham band’s best days are at hand. Banter done, they also offer a shout to Ian’s Chain, a laudable suicide prevention charity.

Matted are where present meets future. A young band disinterested in replays, they want to twist contemporary influences into new forms, the very recipe that might lift them to extraordinary fame. ‘Flowers And Chains’ could be A Perfect Circle if the latter did epic hooks, and the girder-heavy ‘Better’ is, well, better than most. Like Bring Me The Horizon’s Oli Sykes, singer Max Walker wafts around with almost floaty detachment, a brilliant eye to Matted’s hurricane.

Today though, The Hot One Two capably meet Winter’s End needs. Their nuggets of wholesome Brit rock goodness are helped in a big way by Simon West’s soaring vocal gymnastics. Harder in the flesh than in the studio, the Cambridge band remain boisterous, goodtime rockers. With more depth they might theoretically step into shoes vacated by Little Angels, although the real one might yet be wanting those…

While the festival has seen a host of varied acts waving their particular flag, the first two bands on tonight perfectly frame the immense depth our genre has. First we’ve got Fury, a frantically metallic British band who sound exactly as a band called Fury should, and then we hear from the considerably more urbane Preacher Stone, visitors from North Carolina whose cheery country rock fills a hole for anyone who enjoyed Hillbilly Vegas on their recent UK jaunts.

Fury has grown in recent years to include Nyah Ifill who doubles up with Julian Jenkins on vocals. The songs suddenly work so well, you’d think she’d been there all along, and it’s always a treat to see ace bassist Becky Baldwin doing her thing. She also plays with no less an act than black metal royalty Mercyful Fate. Preacher Stone have probably never heard of Mercyful Fate – their heartfelt southern rock is rooted more in sippin’ bourbon, getting “an amen” and things that are a helluva ride. Tonight, via ‘Not Today’ and its brethren, they lay that out for us with practised aplomb.

Way beyond aplomb, way beyond anything you can plan, there are brief episodes at live shows that can freeze a frame in your memory – when by happy accident a song captures the times, soundtracks the moments through which we are living. And so it is with These Wicked Rivers and new song ‘Rise’, the words echoing the feelings of all good folk in the face of Trump and any that would divide us: “Watching all the people rise / It’s happening before my eyes.” This bravura anthem, not rage but gentle determination, reduces some to rubble this fine night. And of course, there’s still the mighty ‘Shine On’, the build-up and avalanche release of its chorus. There’s still the mysterious underbelly groove of ‘Evergreen’ and ‘Don’t Pray for Me’s perfect, poignant pay-off. There’s frontman John Hartwell’s knowing grin, guitarist Arran Day circling, spinning. It’s just a joy to behold. It’s the reason we’ll never stop coming to shows like this.

Incredibly, we’re still not done! It takes an artist as gleamingly great as Tyketto and a life force like Danny Vaughn to top off another rejuvenating Winter’s End. His band has been a mainstay of our world since 1991, but tonight’s no mere nostalgia wash, combining classics like ‘Wings’ and ‘Burning Down Inside’ with equally fine new material such as Planet Rock fave ‘Higher Than High’. It’s music so pristine you’d think Mr Sheen himself had been spraying it, and it’s performed by a line-up equipped with bucket loads of spare talent. Danny’s greyer of plumage these days but fit as a fox and, almost uniquely for singers of his ‘vintage’, possessed of the same voice he started with. He also knows how to hold an audience. It’s both collective and personal. Songs are dedicated, other bands on the bill are praised, and he relates that music is “the circuit of good energy between us.” And still there’s that irresistible sing-song ‘Lay Your Body Down’ and the rarely more apt ‘Forever Young’ to send us happily into the crisp February night. Mission accomplished.

Sunday at Winter's End 2026 in photos:

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