Fri­day: The Beat feat. Rank­ing Junior, Son­ic Boom Six, Die Liga der gewöhn­lichen Gen­tle­men, Sun Byrd, King Zepha Band feat. B Dubbs, Trav­el­ers All Stars, The Mod­birds // Doors: 5:00 PM

Sat­ur­day: Hol­lie Cook, Dave Bark­er Mr. Dou­ble Bar­rel meets The Mag­ic Touch, The Mighty Mocam­bos, Junior Dell & The D‑Lites, Reg­gae Work­ers of the World, The Ban­du­lus Revue feat. Jesse Wag­n­er & Vic Rug­giero, Fly­ing Vipers, Arte Bel­la & The Fel­las, Sooth­say­ers, Dunia & Aram with Lady Hatch­ett and Don Raf­fa, The Mag­ic Touch // Doors: 1.30 PM 

Reg­gae has many facets. Tak­en as an umbrel­la term, it encom­pass­es a wide range of Jamaican styles. Year after year, the Free­dom Sounds Fes­ti­val brings togeth­er acts from around the globe, pri­mar­i­ly rep­re­sent­ing Ska, Ear­ly Reg­gae, Rock­steady, Jamaican Jazz and relat­ed sounds—resulting in a rich­ly var­ied musi­cal pro­gram on stage.

One of Friday’s high­lights is undoubt­ed­ly the Eng­lish 2 Tone band The Beat, fea­tur­ing the suc­cess­ful father-and-son duo Rank­ing Roger and Rank­ing Jnr., whose appear­ance at Free­dom Sounds in 2017 is still fond­ly remem­bered by many. By now, the junior has stepped into his father’s shoes as the band’s lead singer. Also hail­ing from the UK are Manchester’s Son­ic Boom Six, who fuse Punk, Ska, Hip-Hop and Drum & Bass into an explo­sive­ly dance­able mix—complete with a clear polit­i­cal edge.

On Sat­ur­day, it’s well worth arriv­ing ear­ly, as the festival’s main day fea­tures one major name after anoth­er. Head­lin­ing is the enchant­i­ng Hol­lie Cook. Effort­less­ly blend­ing Reg­gae, Lover’s Rock and Trop­i­cal Pop, she has carved out a dis­tinc­tive niche of her own. With Paul Cook, drum­mer of the Sex Pis­tols, as her father and Boy George as her god­fa­ther, it comes as lit­tle sur­prise that her musi­cal roots can be traced back to the leg­endary all-female punk band The Slits.

Dave Bark­er from Kingston is regard­ed as an impor­tant fig­ure in the Reg­gae and Rock­steady scene. In the 1970s he rose to promi­nence as one half of Dave & Ansell Collins. The duo reached the top of the UK charts with their mas­sive hit “Dou­ble Bar­rel”, help­ing bring Reg­gae to an inter­na­tion­al audi­ence. Dave Bark­er will come to Ger­many for an exclu­sive show; he will per­form togeth­er with Berlin’s The Mag­ic Touch – yet anoth­er com­pelling rea­son to attend Free­dom Sounds.