Grunge-rock quartet Headswitcher return from French shows with new single and free headline gig

The band played three shows in Poitiers this month as part of the Les Expressifs festival and are set to play a free hometown gig on Friday to mark the release of the new track.

Headswitcher were picked to play Les Expressifs by the team behind annual Northampton multi-venue festival Twinfest - which itself welcomes acts from France and Marburg in Germany.

Talking about their experience in France, guitarist Oliver Rumens said: “It's hard to describe in words. It was unreal, really.

“It was an eye-opening experience for us, being able to play in a different country. And not only that, but also win over an audience.

“We played three gigs out there, the first we played was to a moderate kind of crowd. The second gig was in an Irish pub and that was quite packed out.

“I think the last gig we played, I was told there was about 600 people watching us.

“Poitiers is a beautiful city to be in and play in.”

Members of Headswitcher were joined in France by Paul Brown and Kenny Precious from Twinfest – having played the event in both 2025 and 2026.

Each year, acts from Northampton are picked to play at twinned events abroad.

Rumens added: “France was a high point not just for the band, but I think in our collective careers as musicians.

“I've been doing this for about 10 years and those were absolutely right up there at the very top of the gigs I've played.”

Rumens is joined in Headswitcher by drummer Harry Hunter, singer and guitarist Kirk Jolly and new bassist Owen Harradine.

Members came together around three years ago in the wake of other bands disbanding – including Rumens’ former band Parking On Pavements.

He said: “Kirk was someone who I wanted to work with because I was always impressed with his songwriting ability.”

Former bassist Callum Brown recorded the band’s initial singles at Klerical Error studios.

Earlier this year, Headswitcher joined artists from across the county to play at the fundraising Together Festival, organised by promoters Picky New.

The event, which was headlined by thistle. and featured acts including Maddox Jones, Woegetter, Fountain, litesleeper, Jack Dawson, Lily On The Green and Mum and Dad Talk To Animals, was raising money for suicide prevention charity Andy’s Mans Club.

Rumens added: “To be able to be asked to do something like that for that kind of charitable cause meant a lot.

“I personally didn't know Tom that well, but Kirk did because he frequented the Garabaldi all the time. Kirk knew him really well and I know Tom is someone who meant a lot to a lot of other people.”

Headswitcher’s new single Growing Pains is released this week and follows Power Outage which was released in September. The latter was their first single in about seven months. For Rumens, the release marks the start of a new chapter for the band.

Written by frontman Jolly, Rumens said, “It’s a song about being heartbroken and lovelorn. It's a very short and snappy, poppy grunge track.

“It's still very heavy. It's still very loud and kind of raucous, but it's also very soft in its lyrical content and its approach.

“It’s probably one of the poppiest songs we've released.”

Growing Pains will already be familiar to fans of the band as it’s been a regular song in their set over the last couple of years.

Rumens revealed their new single and Power Outage would likely be brought together with more new material on an EP in the coming months.

Headswitcher’s sound is rooted in grunge rock, with Rumens citing the likes of early Iron Maiden, Black Sabbath and Oasis among his influences.

He adds: “Generally speaking, we like a lot of 80s and 90s acts, whether it be Soundgarden, Alice in Chains, Pixies or Dinosaur Jr. - but also 70s and 80s punk, so there's probably some Black Flag and Bad Brains influences in there too.”

The band’s return to The King Billy this Friday will see them joined by Moonhaze and as they head into 2027, Rumens adds aside from releasing new material, a priority for the band will be looking to gig more – especially outside of the county.

He said: “I think playing in France definitely gave us more of a push to want to do that. “Northampton is a great place to play and we’ve done shows at the Craufurd Arms in Milton Keynes and Esquires in Bedford but we've mostly been quite homegrown and we’re keen to change that.”

Headswitcher play The King Billy in Commercial Street, Northampton, on Friday, October 30. Music is from 8pm, admission is free.

For more information, visit https://linktr.ee/headswitcheruk