We Out Here festival programmes a line-up of jazz-inflected music. Its diversity is exciting, says Adam Bloodworth
Over fifty festivals have shuttered in the past year. Shockingly, turning a patch of rural grass into a temporary metropolis for the weekend doesn’t chime well with the cost of living crisis. For a midsize event, upfront fees can go north of four million before the gates have even opened. But We Out Here, an independent festival in Dorset and the coolest on the scene right now, was one of a handful to join the ranks of Glastonbury in selling out this summer. Perhaps it’s even making money. What’s its secret? Exceptional music programming. As founder and BBC Radio 6 Music DJ Gilles Peterson yelled from the DJ booth on the final night, “there’s nothing like it anywhere in the world!”
To give some idea of the exciting variety of acts on the line-up, the band Rotary Connection 222 played their first ever set outside of Chicago at this year’s We Out Here, choosing Dorset ahead of places like New York and Boston. Another in the programme, Leroy Burgess, is lauded as the ‘King of Boogie’. Jazz and hip-hop artist Zacchae’us Paul joined from Atlanta, alongside established UK acts like Kokoroko and Loyle Carner.
We Out Here festival: there are few other events this truly multicultural on the UK scene
We Out Here is run alongside Brownswood Recordings, the London-based record label heralded by Peterson that procures and promotes grassroots artists from around the world. There are futuristic electronic artists programmed back to back with musicians representing more classic genres like gospel, jazz and soul. As the day progresses into night, live instruments graduate into beats.
There is an astonishing array of music to get into – but not knowing any of the bands is another valid way to explore We Out Here. By osmosis the calibre of the programming brings with it a hip audience: perhaps more self-consciously cool than at other festivals, definitely the types who make sure to wear the right band tees, but it’s a refreshingly older party set in their forties and fifties who are great company on the dance floor.
We Out Here has grown, and its cultural cache has inspired a crowd of twenty-somethings to turn up, but the festival just about manages to sustain its feel as a safe space for audiences who are obsessively into new music discovery. They need to be careful with growth though, as it feels as if another few thousand more could ruin that vibe.
There is local Dorset beer and cider, great street food, and a very tempting spa area with swimming lake, hot tubs and a sunbathing lawn beneath treetop canopies. One qualm: Peterson and co splashed a little too excessively on the line-up and forgot the toilets, which were in a miserable state throughout the weekend, and no hand sanitiser at any of the male urinals felt like a terrible oversight.
Still, open-mindedness is all you need to make a weekend at We Out Here fun. Nine out of 10 acts we bowled past on the off-chance were great discoveries. Peterson is right: there are few other events this truly multicultural on the UK scene.
We Out Here festival returns in 2026; weoutherefestival.com