Artists to look out for at Lolla ’27
Editor’s note: Limp Bizkit and Indian Ocean for the (relative) oldies. Olivia Dean, KATSEYE, Rachel Chinouriri for the next gen. The Lollapalooza India lineup announcement is one of the most hotly awaited moments of the music calendar each year for fans. With the roster for Lolla ’27 being announced this week, we take a look at nine exciting domestic and international artists that you need to catch at the festival next year. And of course, we have a playlist ready for you!
(PS: discover more Indian artists in our lists of desi alt-electro and homegrown pop music)
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We’re including them on the list because how can we not? But it’s worth asking where these guys land on the relevance spectrum in 2026. In the late ’90s and early 2000s, Limp Bizkit were—maybe alongside Linkin Park—the fresh young kids redefining how young Indians heard rock ’n’ roll. Profane, unabashed, loud, and rocking the f-word out, these guys had a hold on urban Anglophile India with songs like ‘Rollin’’, ‘Take A Look Around’, ‘Nookie’, ‘Break Stuff’. And frontman Fred Durst became a polarising figure you couldn’t really ignore. Then the whole rap-rock/nu-metal thing cooled down, and these guys just sort of faded away. A few years ago, they came back. And now they’re coming here. Is this another case of has-beens popping up in India for a cash grab? Or, in the current age of persistent nostalgia, do Limp Bizkit still retain a hold on public consciousness? Either way, the millennial gang of the era will be there in their red backward hats. (For some bonus trivia: Wes Borland, their gifted guitarist who left the band for a while in between, came to Delhi in the mid-2000s and performed at a mini guitar workshop of sorts followed by a Q&A.)
Much to our pleasant surprise, we get to watch Olivia Dean—whose popularity has skyrocketed these past couple of years—live, as her success builds in real time, rather than decades after her prime.
The London artist has a groovy sound, with soul-pop tunes and a charming accessibility. ‘Man I Need’ is a crowd favourite, and for good reason: it’s bound to get you smiling and dancing along. Her lyrics range from fun and breezy to deep and soulful, and there’s no doubt that her breakout has been more than deserved. Her unique voice, fresh and bright tone and, of course, undeniable stage presence, all point towards her stardom only growing in the years to come.
With Scribe, cheeky, throwaway references to desi pop culture and Bollywood (they’ve put out albums called Mark of Teja and Hail Mogambo) go hand in hand with frantic, livewire music propelled and elevated by vocalist Vishwesh Krishnamoorthy’s distinctive growl-rap-talk-sing delivery. The post-hardcore/metal band, which cut its teeth in the Indian underground rock and metal scenes of the late 2000s and early 2010s, had been out of commission for a while before reuniting last year.
Their sound has a clear modern identity: polished production, crisp grooves, chuggy ratatat riffs, and a dynamic vocal delivery that will effortlessly swing between aggression, goofy humour, and an endearing Mike Patton-esque sense of the absurd and the gibberish. Also: live on stage, they’re a total powerhouse unit.
These guys have just been around forever, picking up fans across all generations and demographics with the kind of music that’s easy to feel and almost impossible to describe. Still, it’s some kind of fusion of rock, jazz, Indian classical, and folk. But really, it’s their own thing. And at the heart of it remains bassist and singer Rahul Ram, whose piercing vocal delivery has, for over 35 years, lent a grounding sense of soul and spirit underpinning the radical conceptual experiments that exist in Indian Ocean’s compositions.
This Australian boyband started out on YouTube, making covers together and posting them online. From there, they grew a following and started playing shows, even opening for One Direction. And thus began their journey into becoming one of the most popular boybands of their time. Their 2014 single ‘She Looks So Perfect’ took the world by storm, and they’ve stuck to their pop-rock guns to this day. Everyone’s a Star!, their full-length album that released last year, is energetic and sometimes gritty, filled with synth punk-rock tunes, building into a complex and cohesive record.
This fearless Mumbai hip hop collective is a multilingual crew of MCs, DJs and producers, graffiti artists, and breakdancers, using their voice to speak out on pressing political and societal issues. They’ve collaborated with Prakash Bhoir, a prominent Adivasi activist and poet, on songs like the breakout ‘Warli Revolt’ and ‘Adivasi’. The politics they espouse are an essential part of their identity, but even beyond that, their songs have this sense of urgency and insistence that drag the listener into the moment. We don’t want to speculate, but these guys are more likely than not going to take the Lolla stage by storm with their irresistible flair.
St. Vincent (or American singer-songwriter Annie Clark) has a restless spirit to her music, forever bouncing around from sounds and styles to find new ways to express—folksy indie, synth-infused pop, art rock, and more. The underlying essence, though, remains undeniably hers. Clark has been an important figure in the alternative scene of the past two decades with her experiments; she’s also been consistently lauded for her guitar chops, making her way on to all-time lists as well.
Anoushka Maskey began life in this world of independent music during the dreaded lockdown era, recording Things I Saw In Dream, her debut album, with a DIY setup and some help from collaborator Cosmic Grooves. She’s gone from strength to strength in the years since, with her catchy and powerful melodies resonating with audiences, finding space on major stages with high profile artists in India and abroad, in addition to having her work featured on Netflix web series. Her most recent album, Epilogue One, released last year, features some stellar songwriting from Maskey, and melodies that really showcase her vocal range and talent.
This “global girl group” hangs in that limbo space between K-Pop and not. They employ the unmistakable aesthetics of the form and have roots in the sound, but are not quite part of the movement. The hugely popular group began life via a rigorous audition process that was later presented in a Netflix documentary, called Pop Star Academy: KATSEYE. In the past two years, they’ve put out a handful of EPs, breaking out from the rigidly manufactured process of inception and finding their own voice.
As always, here is a playlist with all the songs listed in this article. See you in Jan!
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