TISM, TROPICAL FUCK STORM, SPEED AND RATCAT LEAD PROGRAM FOR ALL NEW ADELAIDE BEER & BBQ FESTIVAL
Beer & BBQ Festival, will take up residence at its new home, The Drive in Adelaide on July 10 and 11. Today the festival unveils its first full-scale lineup announcement of music, food and brews to mark this new chapter. A brand new festival with the same great taste!
Leading the music program are Australia’s genre-blurring, boundary-pushing provocateurs TISM, alongside American singer-songwriter Ben Kweller (USA), art-rock force Tropical Fuck Storm, and Sydney hardcore heavyweights SPEED.
Also joining the bill are Sydney indie icons Ratcat, recent Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Tim Rogers, 90s alt-pop favourites The Mavis’s, and one of Australia’s most original voices Kirin J Callinan. They’re joined by noise rock duo Party Dozen, The Loud Hailers featuring Christa Hughes of Machine Gun Fellatio fame, and plenty of South Australian talent, with more to be announced.
Beyond the stage, the festival leans fully into what it does best, food and drink, with three sessions across the weekend: Friday Night (18+), Saturday Day (family friendly) and Saturday Night (18+).
The food lineup features heroes of fire cooking flavours from the USA and across globe including low and slow heavy hitters Big Box BBQ (ACT) and Sydney’s Carolina Smoke (NSW via North Carolina) who is brining the thirst trapping Pork Belly Lollipop back to Adelaide. Expect fired flavours from Jamica, Thailand, Indonesia, Brazil and more.
On the drinks front, a curated mix of Australia’s leading brewers will sit alongside a growing range of ‘not beer’, including wine, gin and other brewed beverages ensuring there’s something for everyone. As always, punters are encouraged to keep their eyes open for surprises around every corner in the new home . . . remember the Secret Pickle Saloon and Dumpster Disco, plus new collaboration experiences including adult putt putt and the Sure Brewing Jukebox.
Beer & BBQ Festival founders Gareth Lewis and Aaron Sandow said the new venue signals a new start, a new festival.
“We can’t wait to see what this little independent festival can look and taste like in its new home. Not only is it more accessible from the city, it allows us more space to be creative and build the festival we want to present now. Beer & BBQ Festival has always been about supporting the brewers, the chefs and the artists and they need support more than ever, this grown-up festival in the heart of the city means they can put their beers in the hands of more punters than ever before. And now we have a big shiny stage to play with!”
Adelaide Beer & BBQ Festival pre-sale opens at 11am today, Wednesday, April 8, at “Wayville Prices”, meaning if you have attended a Beer & BBQ Festival in its former incarnation you will be able to purchase tickets for exactly the same price as you could have last year at the Showground (inflation-free!).
General Public on-sale tomorrow (Thursday, 11am).
THE STORY SO FAR . . .
Adelaide Beer & BBQ Festival (ABBF) was staged for a decade at the Adelaide Showground (RIP 2015-2025).
In that time, it grew to be the largest event of its kind in Australia and hosted more brewers under one roof than any other festival in the country. It weathered a pandemic, it spawned a Limestone Coast offspring, won a few ‘Best Festival’ gongs at the SA Music Awards and evolved into a festival that was much more than the sum of its parts (although there were a lot of parts).
Over that decade the tastes of consumers changed, and brewing has become an increasingly difficult industry to survive in – alongside hospitality, festivals and music. So in 2025, with the costs rising and sales stagnant, we decided that the festival would be the last in its original form, at that venue.
Since early 2025, festival founders Gareth Lewis and Aaron Sandow have been working in the background to explore what the next decade of Beer & BBQ Festival could look like. It’s clear that brewers need eyes on their brands now more than ever, so the evolution needed to include the festival becoming more visible and accessible to mainstream festival punters.
And just like that, Beer & BBQ Fest is all grown up, and landing in the heart of the city this July!
We are very excited to invite you to the inaugural
Beer & BBQ Festival at The Drive (adjacent Adelaide Oval).
In the heart of Adelaide.
July 10 & 11, 2026.
That fabled wander over the footbridge isn’t just reserved for the anticipation and tears of Crows and Power fans, or dropping a small fortune on a touring pop star – it’s now the golden path to the grown-ups playground that is Beer & BBQ Festival.
WHO’S ON THE LINE-UP?
Beer & BBQ Festival has been known for its eclectic, guitar-heavy bookings for some time, but this line-up is a veritable treasure chest of the unique, sublime (and a little ridiculous).
TISM – One of Australia’s most influential bands, TISM have spent decades forging a reputation for their genre-blurring, boundary-smashing, sarcasm-wielding (and entirely anonymous) antics. Aside from a last-minute, tickets-as-rare-as-hens-teeth, pop-up gig at The Gov in 2024 before their headline festival run on the East Coast, TISM have not played a big stage in Adelaide since they set Heaven (RIP) alight in 2004. Leave your expectations at home.
Ben Kweller –Ed Sheeran is an out and proud member of the fan club; “One of my favourite records of the year from one of my favourite songwriters and artists.” Kweller’s heartbreakingly honest 2025 LP Cover The Mirrors name checks collaborators including Waxahatchee, MJ Lenderman and The Flaming Lips. There’s a reason he’s spent the past few decades touring with Bright Eyes, Kings of Leon, Death Cab for Cutie, John Mayer, My Morning Jacket, The Strokes, and (the aforementioned) Ed Sheeran.
Ratcat – Does anyone care that Ratcat haven’t performed in Adelaide for over three decades? Is it worth mentioning that one of the last times they did it was at the very venue they will be performing in July, as touring support for INXS? Who cares. Ratcat are indie royalty, and That Ain’t Bad.
Tropical Fuck Storm – Art punk? Noise rock? Experimental? Whatever Tropical Fuck Storm are, Gareth Liddiard and Fiona Kitschin’s The Drones spinoff project is a force.
SPEED – If you haven’t seen a SPEED mosh pit, then that’s literally what Google was invented for. This Sydney hardcore band has forged a worldwide reputation as a live force with a flute and in the process played just about every major music festival on the planet.
Tim Rogers ‘Le Charme Defensif’ – Recent Rock ‘N’ Roll Hall of Fame inductee Tim Rogers brings his Le Charme Defensif tour, an intimate solo show, to the Secret Pickle Saloon. This will be a moment.
Kirin J Callinan – Soliciting equal parts controversy, confusion and arousal; “If you are willing and able to be a true believer in the essential magic of existence, then attendance is compulsory”, Jack Ladder.
The Mavis’s – Rising to national prominence in the late ‘90s, The Mavis’s earned critical acclaim and multiple ARIA Award nominations, including Single of the Year and Song of the Year for their 1998 hit “Cry.” They are back in 2026, and we are here for it.
Plus Party Dozen (NSW), The Loud Hailers (NSW) feat. Christa Hughes of Machine Gun Fellation-fame, for fans of Amyl & The Sniffers – Public Figures (Vic), Canberra punk revivalists Sonic Reducer and Melbourne’s Sandy Dish. Plus introducing the absurdly brilliant Stupid Fuck The Silly Clown
And Adelaide’s finest Brad Chicken & The Bootstraps, Bromham, El Coyote, Hesh, Jon Ann, Young Offenders, Drew Akin and the debut of I Can’t Believe It’s Not Silverchair (fka I Can’t Believe It’s Not Weezer).
WHAT TO DRINK?
Bowden Brewing . Bridge Road Brewers . Coopers . Crafty Robot Brewing . Deep Elite Brewing . Elix-Elite . Heaps Good Spirits . Heaps Normal . Little Bang Brewing . Lobo Cider & Spirits . Loophole Brewing Co . Mountain Culture Beer Co . Muffy Malone Brewing . Mxtology . No Eye Deer Brewing . Noodledoof . Penny Red Beer Co . Pikes Beer . Co . Range Brewing . Shapeshifter Brewing Co . Sixtwelve Brewing . South Coast Brewing Co & Chubby Unicorn Brewing . Sure Brewing . The Suburban Brew . The Uraidla Brewery . Tiny Fish Brew Co . Tops . Watsacowie Brewing Company . Woolstore Brewery & Many More To Be Announced.
WHAT TO EAT?
Big Box Bbq (Act) . Carolina Smoke (Nsw) . Smokey Uppercuts . Bread & Bone Wood Grill . Leon’s Smash Burgers (Vic) . Wings World (Aurora, Illinois) . Baltic Fine Food . Braz Oz Brazillian Bbq (Vic) . Eggelaide . Franklin Harbour Oyster Co . From Blammo . Jamaican Mi Eat . Lion’s Roar Bbq . Ninin’s Indo Street Food, Smokin Grillers . Taco Cartel Vs Nugg Lyf.
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