CORBRIDGE festival will be something of a homecoming gig for bassist Dan Crowther.

His mum, Gayle Foster, runs Vintage at the Tower in Corbridge and he attended Hexham’s Queen Elizabeth High School – but he’s now a member of Saytr Play.

The Manchester-based Indie Pop outfit are made up of Fred Farrell, Jamie Vere, Thomas Castrey, and Juanan Garcia alongside Dan.

The band will be performing at the festival this weekend. They’ll be joining the likes of Reef and the Fun Loving Criminals.

Dan’s excited to play in front of a home crowd – and see his family, of course.

Saytr Play came together when Fred, Jamie, and Dan met whilst at university. The trio moved to Manchester to try and make a go of their musical career, and were joined by Thomas and Juanan.

Over the past year, Saytr Play – who have drawn comparisons to the likes of The Strokes, Catfish and the Bottleman and even Iggy Pop – have started to make a name for themselves.

Their first two singles Mother’s Love and Don’t Go East, have both gone down a storm. Their third, Fragile, was produced by Courteeners bassist Joe Cross, and released on his own ‘Lovers Music’ label.

Dan explained: “I went to uni in Preston studying music production.

“I met Jamie and our singer Freddie there and I was recording some tracks for them when they realised they didn’t have a bass player.

“That was a few years ago now – I can’t actually remember what year!

“We moved to Manchester and started doing it properly and went in a new direction and it’s been taking off.

“Music has always been something at the back of my mind. It’s now what I’m focusing on.”

Corbridge isn’t the only festival that’s snapped up Saytr Play this summer.

They’ll also be playing at Kendal Calling in Cumbria and Y Not Festival in Derbyshire – and they have no plans to stop there.

Dan continued: “We’re playing Kendal and Y Not this summer, and we’ve sold out Gorilla in Manchester, which has a capacity of 500. We’re looking to do bigger than that by next year.

“We want to get an EP or an album out by the start of spring next year, but we have singles to get out the way so I can’t really put a timescale on it.”