Subterranean Sound 2023 Preview

Words by Oisín Campbell / Design by Michael Savage

Subterranean Sound reboots for its second instalment this weekend at Edinburgh’s Sweetdram Distillery for two days of genre-bending underground sounds from some of the city’s most respected names.

Buy tickets here: https://ra.co/events/1706644

Served up by Edinburgh’s GRDN collective who have become synonymous with secret parties in obscure locations around the capital for some years now, Subterranean Sound stands as their biggest project to date.

Last year’s initiation at Leith’s Biscuit Factory provided one of the great parties of 2022 and proved the group’s metal for hosting events of a larger scale. The Biscuit Factory was flipped upside down giving way to a proper old skool warehouse feel, with DJs framed in the centre of the floor armed by a steel grid of lasers & lights, all the while facing into the epic GRDN soundsystem towards the room’s back wall.

A sea of dancers young & old were in attendance across the two dates last October, and it is expected that this weekend’s edition will produce an ever bigger crowd kicking off this Friday at the new location of Sweetdram Distillery (soon to be closing its door for public use).

(Pictured: the GRDN collective performing at Subterranean Sound 2022).

Once again, this year’s line-up is composed only of Auld Reekie’s finest featuring spearheads from the city’s underground elite.

Friday’s highlights include female hip-hop expert selector Arusa Qureshi, bass starlet LWS (Headset, Peder Mannerfelt Produktion, Grafters), dancehall dynamo DJ Rawzi (Winner of Young Sounds DJ 2022), and XOXA New York’s Panooc. Also featured are St Sunday, Jedda b2b Bokonon, Aidan Gibson, noodle & Moray Leisure Centre.

(Pictured: LWS)

Saturday boasts an equally mouth watering selection of talent ranging from local house legend Telfort, Arabic funk and hip-hop groove setters Shahrazadi, hard-dance speed merchants Lucky Dip, soul master PAPAJGUN, with Broons, Gummuki, DJ Neb, Releaf, and Bartek starring also.

(Pictured: Shahrazadi)

Preparing for their biggest show to date, the inspiring GRDN collective are backing local talent and local dancers with their untamed DIY ethos as they ready for round 2. In the murky economic waters of today and uninspiring political climate that continues to unravel before us, it is events like this that become vital within our nightlife and club-culture ecosystems. Something daring and different that doesn’t give in to the commercial overlords, across the two days you can prepare to be met by a more than robust hand-built sound-system, custom modified staging; detailed down to the last bolt, hypnotic lighting, lasers and strobe, and without a doubt a like minded task force of dancers and selectors.

There is much for the crew behind the festival to be proud of before even getting into the festivities. If there is one place that you should be this weekend if you have any inkling towards Scotland’s underground, then you simply cannot miss this. Tickets continue to grow short on Resident Advisor -> Get over there now: https://ra.co/events/1706644