Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August
- John Hayhurst
- 8 hours ago
- 9 min read
Rain Pours, but RAYE Shines, and Leeds Festival 2026 Bows Out in Style
Words & Photos - John Hayhurst
Saturday gave us perhaps the most varied day of Leeds Festival so far. We started small with Tooth on The Canopy before Bleech 9:3 continued their rapid rise inside The Ballroom. KEO had the considerably bigger surroundings of The Grid to contend with, while Skye Newman, ADÉLA and Geese gave us three completely different reasons to spend a good portion of the afternoon inside The Gallery. Fontaines DC then closed the evening with a set for the ages.
Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August
Three days into Leeds and the new stages have stopped feeling particularly new; we're no longer checking which direction The Ballroom or The Canopy is in, we're just working out how quickly we can get from one to another.
Our final day started at The Grid with Absolutely, and she was immaculate in looks and sound.
The stage was transformed by a backdrop resembling the inside of a dolls house, giving her set a distinctive visual identity from the outset. It was a surprisingly intimate image to place on such an enormous festival stage, but it worked.
Absolutely looked completely comfortable in the surroundings, moving through songs including Arrivals, No Furniture and I Just Don't Know You Yet with the confidence of somebody who already understands how to fill a space - even daring a version of the ABBA classic Chiquitita.
She may also be known as RAYE's sister, but there was very little about the performance that suggested she needed to rely on that connection for attention. The vocals were strong, the presentation was polished and the whole thing felt carefully considered without becoming overworked. For an early Sunday set, Absolutely set the bar surprisingly high.
Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August
From there, we headed into The Gallery for Say Now.
The trio certainly know how to put on a performance. The choreography was slick, precise and impressively coordinated, particularly through songs including Supermarket, Can't Keep a Beat and Brick by Brick. They had the energy and the confidence needed to keep an early festival crowd interested.
Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August
There were, however, a few moments where the vocals appeared so perfectly aligned with the performance that we found ourselves wondering whether they might be miming occasionally. We can't confirm that they were, and it may simply have been the way the production was put together, but there were moments when it felt more like a dance session rather than a gig.
However, back outside at The Grid, Slayyyter was about to bring the fun.
Catherine Slater, better known as Slayyyter, isn't particularly interested in subtle pop music.
Her current WOR$T GIRL IN THE WORLD era pushes things even further, and DANCE... makes that clear almost immediately. OLD TECHNOLOGY has the same deliberately excessive production before CRANK turns things harder and considerably less polished.
CANNIBALISM! and YES GODDD are built for the visual side of a Slayyyter performance as much as the music itself, and that's important on a stage as exposed as The Grid. There's nowhere to hide out here and Slayyyter doesn't attempt to.
Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August
BRITTANY MURPHY. is one of the more immediately memorable moments, while brand new chanel$ and BEAT UP CHANEL$ give the latter part of the set the kind of relentless finish that suits her perfectly. It is loud, deliberately trashy in places, heavily stylised and unlikely to convert anybody who fundamentally dislikes what Slayyyter does. For everybody else, that's rather the point.
The mood changed completely when we stepped back inside The Gallery for Clara La San.
Songs like In This Darkness and All I Wanna Do suited the enclosed atmosphere of The Gallery, where the lights and production helped build a black and white world around the music.
Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August
Finishing with Rock Your Body and Feel Good she didn't need to constantly demand attention from the crowd. There was something more reserved about the performance, but it worked. Clara La San seemed perfectly happy to let the mood do some of the work for her.
A quick trip next door took us into The Ballroom for The North, where we caught just enough of the set to get a feel for what the band were doing before the temptation to move again got the better of us.
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This was where the new layout really came into its own. We could have stayed and watched every minute, of course, but when three stages are practically neighbours, there is something particularly satisfying about grabbing a couple of songs and seeing what is happening somewhere else.
That instinct took us over to The Canopy for Ruby Roberts.
Quite possibly the most beautiful woman we saw across the entire festival, Roberts fortunately had more going for her than simply looking incredible on stage. She also had a genuinely decent singing voice, and songs including My Endeavour and Trampoline from her 'Somersault Queen album from late last year gave us enough reason to stop and listen, rather than immediately rushing off towards the next act.
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Then came Cruz Beckham and The Breakers, also on The Canopy.
By this point, the joke had been made enough times across the weekend that Cruz Beckham decided to make it himself. “Hey Leeds, welcome to the Nepo Baby Stage.”
The audacity. And honestly, fair play.
After Violet Grohl, Gene Gallagher and Moses Martin had all appeared across the weekend, The Canopy's unofficial nickname had become increasingly difficult to resist. But out of all the so-called nepo babies we saw at Leeds, Cruz Beckham was probably the best.
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Opening with Wannabe, he and The Breakers played with far more confidence than we had perhaps expected, while LICK THE TOAD and Yeah Yeah Yeah showed that there was actually something worth listening to beyond the famous surname.
The family connection might have brought curiosity, but the set itself kept our attention. Cruz and the band looked like a proper group rather than somebody taking advantage of an opportunity because of who his parents are. And after making the joke before anyone else could make it for him, he had already won some points.
Back in The Ballroom, Basht. were next on our increasingly chaotic route around the arena.
We caught a handful of songs before doing exactly what the new layout had encouraged us to do all day: moving again.
Over in The Gallery, Kingfishr were already underway. This wasn't a case of trying to review every second of either performance. It was more of a festival smash and grab — three songs here, a couple there — but that's the beauty of these three stages. You don't have to choose between committing to one act or missing everything else around it.
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By the time we headed back to The Grid for JADE, it felt as though we had already fitted an entire day into a few hours.
If there was any concern that leaving Little Mix might result in Jade Thirlwall choosing the safest possible route into a solo career, THAT'S SHOWBIZ BABY! answered it fairly quickly. Live, she pushes that unpredictability even further.
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IT girl has been opening her recent festival sets and immediately establishes that this isn't simply Little Mix with three members missing. FUFN (F*ck You for Now) follows and Before You Break My Heart and Fantasy show just how confidently JADE now moves between straight pop and something considerably stranger.
She isn't pretending her past doesn't exist either. Wasabi gets another life in the set, while a rapid Little Mix section brings together pieces of Touch, Salute, Power and Shout Out to My Ex. It's partly nostalgia, obviously, but it also provides a useful comparison with how different the artist standing on The Grid now actually is.
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Church bring us firmly back to the present before Angel of My Dreams finishes things. It remains a brilliantly odd pop song — several ideas fighting for space inside a few minutes — and JADE performs it with the confidence of somebody who finally has complete control over exactly how strange she wants things to get.
Then came SOMBR. If anyone brought genuine American rock star energy to Leeds Festival, it was him. His energy was never ending, and the full on performance was built for a stage like The Grid.
we never dated and i wish i knew how to quit you got things moving before come closer, Homewrecker and My Body Isn't Ready demonstrated the scale of his appeal.
Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August
By the time undressed and Potential arrived, the audience was completely with him. He teased the audience with a question of whether Leeds was better than Reading (ooh that’s a new one - not).
Unfortunately, the weather had other ideas. As the latter part of his performance continued, the rain began. At first, it was manageable. By the end of the set, however, it was becoming increasingly clear that Sunday evening at Leeds Festival was going to be a wet one.
SOMBR's confidence as a performer was obvious. He looked like somebody determined to make the most of every inch of the stage "rain or shine", and the audience responded to it. back to friends became one of the biggest moments of the set as he made his way through the crowd in the rain, by then he was seriously running close to his allotted time, and sure enough during 12 to 12 the sound was cut off and he left the stage and left a massive impression on this audience.
Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August
Thankfully, our next stop was The Canopy for Gurriers. And we were going to need that tent.
The rain outside had moved from inconvenient to absolutely pouring down, but Gurriers were providing enough madness inside to ensure nobody was particularly concerned about the weather.
The Dublin band brought their usual intensity to the stage, tearing through songs including Nobody's Coming to Save You, Party Lines and then during Des Goblin the band's guitarist ended up in the audience sitting on somebody's shoulders. Still playing.
Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August
Then a circle pit formed around him. Still playing. Somehow, the situation escalated even further when he eventually crowd-surfed his way back towards the stage. Still playing. It was totally nuts.
And as the rain continued hammering down outside, we were at least grateful to be watching it all from underneath some canvas.There have been plenty of polished performances across Leeds this weekend. Gurriers aren't here to provide another one.
There was now only one act left for us to see. RAYE. The last few years have completely changed the scale at which Rachel Keen operates. The story of leaving her label and finally gaining control of her own career has been repeated enough times now that it risks overshadowing the more important point: RAYE has developed into an exceptional live performer.
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However, ten minutes before she was due to take to The Grid, the weather went from dramatic to genuinely concerning. The rain was torrential, we had thunder & lightning. For a few minutes, it genuinely looked as though the entire event could be cancelled. After almost four days at Leeds Festival, it seemed almost ridiculous that the weather might finally bring everything to a halt just as we were about to see our final act.
But with some kind of divine intervention, eventually, the storm passed. And RAYE and her band took to the stage to a heroes welcome from the soaking wet audience that had loyally stayed there throughout the storm. It was worth the wait.
Escapism. remains the song most immediately recognised across the field, but the current set gives considerably more space to the artist she has become since it was released. Beware.. The South London Lover Boy. and Skin & Bones. bring us into the newer material, while Worth It. gives RAYE room to demonstrate the jazz influence that has become increasingly important to her live shows.
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There is very little separation between RAYE the pop singer and RAYE the vocalist anymore. Oscar Winning Tears. allows her to really push the latter, while Click Clack Symphony. is theatrical without feeling as though the performance has swallowed the song.
The older hits haven't disappeared. BED/You Don't Know Me, Secrets and Prada can be compressed into a reminder of just how many songs RAYE had already been involved with before the rest of the industry finally started paying proper attention.
And then there's WHERE IS MY HUSBAND! It has quickly become one of those songs where the audience knows exactly what is expected of them. By the time RAYE reaches the chorus, The Grid is doing plenty of the work for her and everyone has forgotten about the weather.
Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August
RAYE doesn't feel like an artist working towards being capable of headlining festivals anymore. She feels like one waiting for the festivals to catch up. And finally, after four days, countless trips between stages and considerably more walking than we'd like to calculate, that's where our Leeds Festival 2026 comes to an end.
It started on Thursday with something Leeds had never done before. Kasabian became the festival's first Thursday night headliner on the Main Stage.
Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August
Friday was when the redesigned arena really came alive. We moved between The Gallery, The Ballroom, The Canopy and The Grid, from Westside Cowboy and Violet Grohl through to Florence + The Machine, Paris Paloma and a typically uncompromising Kneecap.
Saturday brought Bleech 9:3, KEO, Skye Newman, Geese and unpeople before Fontaines D.C. showed just how far they've travelled from the smaller stages they once occupied.
And Sunday gave us everything from the emerging Absolutely, Gurriers and Cruz Beckham and The Breakers to several completely different main stage performances from SLAYYYTER, JADE, SOMBR and finally RAYE.
Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August Pepsi Presents Leeds Festival 2026 @ Bramham Park - Day Four - Sunday 30th August
The biggest question coming into Leeds Festival 2026 was whether the arena overhaul would actually make much difference once thousands of people arrived at Bramham Park. Four days later, The Grid, The Gallery, The Ballroom and The Canopy already feel like essential individual parts of the festival.
For us, though, Leeds is always about what happens on those stages rather than what they're called. We've found some things we expected to love, some we didn't expect at all, and probably missed another dozen sets while running across Bramham Park trying to get to the next gig. That's festivals.
We'll see you back at Bramham Park to do it all again at Leeds Festival 2027.
Keep an eye on the official Leeds Festival ticket page for 2027 Early Bird tickets: Sign Up HERE - https://www.leedsfestival.com/tickets
