Steve Lamacq is acknowledged as one of the UK’s most avid supporters of new bands, and currently presents Mondays, 4-7pm on BBC Radio 6 Music following hosting fulltime weekdays for 18 years.
Steve is also Chair of LIVE, the umbrella trade body representing all corners of the UK’s live music industry. He also co-presents The Price of Music Podcast.
In 2013 Steve celebrated 20 years at the BBC and he was honoured with the Special Award at the Sony Radio Academy Awards.
He is now also a familiar voice on BBC Radio 2 through a number of landmark documentaries on British music (including The Digital Music Explosion, The Creation Records Story and the National Great British Music Debate).
Steve is also a regular contributor for Fighting Talk on BBC Radio 5 Live, a station that also allowed Steve to bring his love of both music and football together to host his show, Rock ‘n’ Roll FA Cup.
Steve came to prominence on BBC Radio 1 on shows including the influential Evening Session, Lamacq Live and one of their flagship In New Music We Trust shows.
Steve’s first radio experience was at XFM, where he presented the drive time slot. However, his background previous to this was in journalism.
Training at Harlow College before starting work as a junior reporter with the West Essex Gazette, he then moved to its sister paper, The Harlow Gazette becoming sports editor at the age of 21. He joined the New Musical Express in November 1987 as a sub-editor, progressed to news editor two years later and finally became live editor in 1991 developing a reputation for discovering new bands along the way.
He’s continued writing throughout his radio career and published his book Going Deaf for a Living in October 2000, detailing his career to date and notorious interviews with the likes of Nirvana and Oasis.
As a long-standing tastemaker Steve was at the centre of Britpop and has given a variety of artists their first ever radio play, including Coldplay, Bloc Party, Muse, Alt-J and Catfish & the Bottlemen who all received their first break on Steve’s shows.
In 2013 he was given a special award for his championing of new music by the Association Of Independent Music, presented to him by Richard Hawley.
Huw Stephens is a presenter, dj and host.
Huw joined BBC Radio 1 at 17, becoming the youngest ever Radio 1 DJ. He has broadcast live from Glastonbury, Reading Festival, Sonar, South by South West, Eurosonic on BBC Radio 1, as well as live from Radio 1’s own Teen Awards and Big Weekend. His passion for new music has meant he has been the first to champion countless new artists early on.
He presents on BBC 6Music 4-7pm Tuesday to Friday, as well as weekly shows on BBC Radio Wales, Radio Cymru and is a regular host of Saturday Live on BBC Radio 4. Huw has contributed to BBC Radio 2, BBC Sounds and presents regularly on the BBC World Service.
He hosts live events regularly, from corporate nights to world famous events including the NME Awards and the Bafta Cymru Awards.
Huw is the founder of the Swn Festival in Cardiff, Wales’ premier new music festival which he founded in 2007, and won Best Small Festival at the NME Awards in 2014. He curates the Lake Stage at Latitude Festival, which saw early appearances by the xx, Alt J, The 1975, Catfish and the Bottlemen and many more. He also comperes the main stage at Reading Festival. Huw has dj’d and curated at Green Man Festival, Festival no 6, Bestival, T in the Park and Glastonbury.
He djs regularly around the UK to thousands, and has dj’d around the world in Venezuela, Barcelona, Iceland, Norway, Austin Texas, New York, New Zealand and Patagonia. Since 2006, Huw Stephens Presents has been a monthly live music night in London’s The Social, playing host to new artists.
Huw presents a weekly show on BBC Radio Cymru playing new artists from Wales and the world. He champions new music and dj’s at the Eisteddfod, the National Festival of Wales. He founded two record labels; Boobytrap and Am Records, and has released two compilations on Wichita Recordings named Music Sounds Better With Huw.
Huw’s television credits include hosting the Glastonbury Festival on BBC2, the Topman CTRL series for Channel 4, coverage at Reading Festival for BBC 1 & 4, and voice over work for BBC3, Discovery Channel, and music campaigns for The 1975, Bombay Bicycle Club and PJ Harvey amongst others. He was nominated twice for Best Presenter at the Bafta Cymru Awards for his presenting on music series Bandit for S4C. In 2014 he presented a piece on Dylan Thomas on location in New York for BBC Worlwide Online.
He has an Honorary Degree from the Open University, and an Honorary Fellowship from the University of Glamorgan and Bangor University. He was inducted in to the Gorsedd of Bards of the Isle of Great Britain in 2012.