Fontaines D.C. at Electric Picnic 2026: The Road To The Main Stage

Eight years ago, Fontaines D.C. – wrapped in the natural amphitheatre of what was then the Body & Soul stage – played to a relatively intimate gathering of fans, friends and wandering festival-goers at Electric Picnic.

Freshly graduated from BIMM Dublin, the young band found themselves competing for the crowd’s attention against a large, inflatable crocodile – which people, in typically madcap EP-style, were taking turns to sled down the hill on. Fontaines, unsurprisingly, won that battle.

Fontaines DC at Electric Picnic 2018. Copyright Nick O Donnell

Already considered one of the Irish scene’s most buzzed-about new bands, their raw talent was undeniable, as they tore into tracks like ‘Boys In The Better Land’, ‘Chequeless Reckless’ and ‘Liberty Belle’ – all of which would feature on their acclaimed debut album, Dogrel, released less than eight months later.

By the time they next played the festival, in 2022, they had more than made good on that early promise, with three albums now under their belt: the Mercury Prize-shortlisted Dogrel; the Grammy-nominated A Hero’s Death; and Skinty Fia, which had debuted at No.1 in both the UK and Ireland just a few months earlier.

As they demonstrated in no uncertain terms at that Electric Arena set, Skinty Fia opened up a bold new sonic world for the group, moving away from the plucky post-punk emphasis of their earlier work. While digging into their Irishness with more passion and fearlessness than ever, the third album officially marked their arrival onto the world stage – with the five-piece securing the BRIT Award for International Group the following year.

Fontaines D.C. at Electric Picnic 2022. Copyright Miguel Ruiz.

Thankfully, that growing platform and fame didn’t lead to safe, stick-to-the-script music and laurel-resting. Following the release of frontman Grian Chatten’s lauded solo LP, 2023's Chaos For The Fly, the band returned a year later with their most captivating, adventurous release yet: Romance.

Zooming out from their ruminations on Irish identity, Romance – which they recorded with producer James Ford – found the band exploring a dystopian, futuristic universe, inspired by the likes of Akira and Blade Runner. But the sense of doom at the centre of Romance’s fictional world was also informed by very real concerns.

“Climate anxiety, Gaza, and everything in the Congo… it’s difficult to think about it, and then revert back to having a conversation about music, or watching The Bear,” Grian told Hot Press around the time of the release. “The record is about that tension between escapism, and the harsh overwhelming reality.”

While touring the album, Fontaines continued to use their platform to stand up for what matters – voicing their support for Palestine on major festival stages like Roskilde and Primavera, as well as at their biggest headline show to date, at a sold-out Finsbury Park in July ‘25. They also raised over €200,000 for Medical Aid for Palestinians through their Romance-inspired jersey collaboration with Bohemian FC – which Greta Thunberg famously sported while sailing towards Gaza on a Freedom Flotilla Coalition mission last year.

That Romance era came to a close, however, at the end of last summer, and up until this month, it had been a year since Fontaines played a live show – which explains the increasing popularity of bizarrely-named tribute acts like Fontaines C.D. in meantime.

But that’s not to say the real band have spent the past 12 months completely out of the spotlight. Earlier this year, they teamed up with James Ford once again for the star-studded HELP(2) album, with the band covering Sinéad O’Connor’s ‘Black Boys On Mopeds’, and Grian also appearing on the track ‘Flags’ with Damon Albarn and Kae Tempest.

Damon Albarn, Grian Chatten and Kae Tempest. Credit: Lawrence Watson

HELP(2) just so happened to share the same March 6 release date as the official soundtrack to Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man – which also featured contributions from the Fontaines gang, including the lead single ‘Puppet’, written and recorded by Grian, alongside composers Antony Genn and Martin Slattery. The star of the film, self-described Fontaines D.C. “groupie” Cillian Murphy, helped initiate the collaboration – noting that the “lyrics, the darkness, the menace that’s in their music just felt perfect for the world of Peaky Blinders…”

Members of the band have also been kept busy with other behind-the-scenes projects – from drummer Tom Coll launching a new Irish label and online store, Inis Records, to guitarist Carlos O’Connell producing Dead Dads Club’s self-titled debut album.

During an NME interview around the Dead Dads Club release, Carlos offered some insight into Fontaines’ plans for their end-of-summer shows – claiming he wasn’t sure if the band would be completely abandoning the world of Romance just yet.

“Romance was so intense in every [way],” he remarked. “The visual, the production, the setlist... It wasn’t just about the music. Romance was about a million more things, I think, and it’s a bit strange to move on from it completely, just because it’s an album.

“I guess that’s the decision to make. Does that become the identity of the band, or actually, it’s just a phase and you reinvent it? I don’t know. I don’t know if I want to dye my hair pink again...”

Now, with just weeks to go until they make their Electric Picnic return, Fontaines have offered up their first official insight into their next chapter, with 'Marianne' – released as the lead single from their fifth studio album, Dopamine Chamber, due out October 16.

"I think Romance was maybe 60 per cent human and 40 per cent corrupted by automation, and a loss of feeling,” Grian says of the new LP. "This one feels more like 60 per cent corrupted – the mask is wearing the face a little more.

"I felt it would be more powerful to leave the hope out and reflect the ugliness honestly. This one needed to feel more like a catastrophic warning.”

As fans prepare to enter into that new sonic world, there's no doubt that Fontaines' first ever headline performance at Electric Picnic is set to be both momentous and emotional – as not only their first Irish performance in a year, but also their first show back home since the tragic death of Trevor Dietz, their long-time manager, in June. In a tribute shared online, they described Trevor – a beloved figure on the Irish music scene – as “the sixth member of the band,” who was there from the beginning of their journey.

Of course, as Trevor told us at the Hot Press MIX Course wrap night back in 2019, he would never have got involved with the band all those years ago “if they hadn’t had huge expectations and huge dreams.”

Trevor Dietz at Ireland Music Week 2019 in Lost Lane. Copyright Miguel Ruiz.

It’s safe to say that, however huge those early dreams were, Fontaines have made them come true tenfold by now – for both themselves, and the people who’ve supported and believed in them from the get-go.

Whatever happens next, you can bet the Dublin-formed five-piece will still be defying expectations for decades to come – one brilliantly conceived, boundary-pushing album at a time.

• Fontaines D.C. play Electric Picnic's Main Stage at 10.30pm on Sunday, August 30.