Peace & Love Festival 2012

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Daniel Adams Ray @ Peace & Love Festival 2011. Photograph by Emma Svensson.

Held in Borlänge, in the Dalarna province, Peace & Love is Sweden’s biggest music festival with some 50,000 revellers making their way to the heart of the country. Kicking off today and carrying on through until Saturday (30 June) the fourteenth annual affair is pretty much just as free-thinking and free-loving as its name would suggest with a the line-up that brings together burgeoning local talent, international headliners and passionate speakers looking to change the world for the better. For a heavily nordic slant on the musical must-sees head to our sister site JaJaJa, and read on below for our own recommendations.

Regina Spektor

Back on the road after the release of her sixth album What We Saw From The Cheap Seats, a festival performance from Regina Spektor promises all the lo-fi sounds of her early material with the more daring, complex electronically driven avant garde compositions of late.

Anna Ternheim

Anna Ternheim has an unrivalled flair for combining that drawling American country sound with the delicate and bleak aesthetics often associated with her native home.

Amanda Mair

Genuinely one of the most exciting Swedish pop exports of late, Amanda Mair will undoubtedly deliver an euphoric performance.

M. Ward

For that moment when you just can’t take any more electro-pop (we mean for like an hour or so) M. Ward can sooth your aching feet and calm your buzzing mind with his warm, cracked vocals and gentle acoustic rhythms.

Icona Pop

Nothing could suit the feverish, giddy enthusiasm of those late night festival hours quite as much as the utterly intoxicating pop of Caroline Hjelt and Aino Jawo.

Kurt Vile & The Violators

Kurt Vile & co will be injecting a much needed dose of americana into this week’s proceedings.

Jonathan Johansson

Swedish native Jonathan Johansson promises bruised, romantic outpourings in his native tongue, as grounded in warm ambience and they are in cold, clean compositions.

Niki & The Dove

A rush of adrenaline, a quickening heart rate, a fierce desire to sing along and the inability to stand still are all well documented side affects of watching Malin Dahlström and Gustaf Karlöf (with god knows how many drummers in tow) live. Catch their set at your own risk!

Other Lives

The Oklahoma based folk troupe play the most incredible array of instruments live, tugging at your heart with brooding melodies of longing and lifting your spirits with delicate string arrangements.

The Shins

Albuquerque’s finest indie-pop five-piece returned with their fourth studio album earlier this year and proved that whilst their jangly, ‘New Slang’ days are not entirely behind them, they certainly aren’t a one trick pony.

For more information and the full line-up head here.