International Drone Day is back with a 2025 edition. The Whitstable (Kent) based monthly electronic meet-up session and podcast Coastal Electronauts have announced another edition with live performances from Sam Battle aka Look Mum No Computer, Shape Navigator, Sophie Sirota, Analoguemechanic, Sebtic Smile, John Gallen, and Ghostyhed.

The International Drone Day festival will take place on 17th May 2025 at the Gulbenkian Theatre situated within Kent University in nearby Canterbury. The event commences at 7.30pm. Tickets can be ordered here.

A Café stage situated in the theatre bar will see Sebtic Smile and Ghostyhed hosting a communal drone/jam from 5pm, for which attendees are invited to bring their own and join in, while the same two artists plus John Gallen will perform their own music from 9.30pm following the conclusion of proceedings in the main theatre.

International Drone Day was originally conceived by Marie LeBlanc Flanagan of Weird Canada in 2014 with events happening worldwide.

International Drone Day performers

Look Mum No Computer (aka Sam Battle) began uploading videos to YouTube in 2017, issuing a debut EP that autumn. A series of EPs and albums followed. He also writes and produces for other artists and continues to share content on his YouTube channel, which now has over 650,000 subscribers. Whether building the musical Gameboy Mega Machine, an organ from the ’90s toy Furbies, or conducting an orchestra of 97 Lego Star Wars Droids to perform the film’s theme song, Battle is constantly working on creative musical projects. Building his own synthesisers and musical machines, he performs on them.

Peter Coyte (aka Shape Navigator) is a composer, musician and sound artist whose career spans multiple genres and creative fields. His career began in the ‘90s when he signed to Guerilla Records as a solo artist and also collaborated with Coldcut, Seal, David McAlmont and Heartless Crew. He is also known for his work in theatre, film and installations, writing compositions. He has forged long-term partnerships with filmmakers Francois Verster and Joanna Callaghan, choreographer Dora Frankel, writer/poet Salena Godden and dragademic John-Paul Zaccarini. He is a co-founder of the Coastal Electronauts Podcast and music sessions.

Sophie Sirota is a classically trained violist, singer and composer. Having enjoyed a long, genre-spanning career, she has worked as a session musician, live performer, arranger and composer with artists that include 4-Hero, D’Influence, Gabrielle, Beth Orton, Ed Harcourt, Paul Weller, Kim Deal, Robert Kirkby and Tindersticks, as well as visual artists Jeremy Millar and Sadie Hennessey. A member of Coastal Electronauts and the Free Range String Orchestra, she blends her classical training with modern experimental sounds, utilising looper and effects pedals to create ambient soundscapes.

Clive Walpole (aka AnalogueMechanic) is a composer of experimental and electronic music. His early teens saw him creating experimental music using tape recorders and found sounds, before graduating to synthesisers and purely electronic music in the mid ‘70s. His influences include BBC Radiophonic Workshop pioneers Delia Derbyshire and Daphne Oram, F. C. Judd and more.

Creating video/projection art in both analogue and digital spaces, @diz_qo has experimented in tape/slide, 16mm film and video art, utilising abandoned buildings and found materials for site-specific events as part of the Colosseum Project/Luna Nera art collective. diz_qo has also created video installations at iKlectik, the Coastal Electronauts International Drone Day and meet-up sessions, Wonky Plonky Electronk events, Orbscure Festival, Delaware Festival, Intrinsic, Cluster, Alchemy, Tinderdust and group show Spellzone.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

Chief editor of Side-Line – which basically means I spend my days wading through a relentless flood of press releases from labels, artists, DJs, and zealous correspondents. My job? Strip out the promo nonsense, verify what’s actually real, and decide which stories make the cut and which get tossed into the digital void. Outside the news filter bubble, I’m all in for quality sushi and helping raise funds for Ukraine’s ongoing fight against the modern-day axis of evil.

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