Tide Lines ready for Hebcelt’s first hat trick Of shows

It says everything about the adulation enjoyed by Tide Lines in the Hebrides that their appearance at this year’s HebCelt will set a new record.

The band will be on stage for a third successive year, an unprecedented step for the internationally-renowned festival in its 24th year, but one that will find no dissent from its audience.

Formed in 2016, the four-piece played their first Hebridean Celtic Festival gig the following year in the small Breasclete Hall in Lewis and also performed on the Islands Stage in the main arena.

After that stunning debut, they returned in 2018 to play the main stage and this year they are back as headliners.

“We absolutely love HebCelt and are really looking forward to coming back for the third year in a row”, says lead singer Robert Robertson. “I think it’s a mix of the atmosphere around the town, the carry on with the other bands after the gig, which has always been great in previous years, and of course the gig itself.”

After launching on social media in 2016, Tide Lines have become a phenomenon. Their debut single, ‘Far Side of the World’, entered the UK download charts less than 24 hours after they were formed and their fervent online fanbase ensure their gigs sell out in minutes. With a growing following across the UK and in Europe, they were also shortlisted for Live Act of the Year in the 2017 MG Alba Scots Trad Music Awards.

The release of their debut album ‘Dreams We Never Lost’ in 2017 added to their reputation and their growing on-stage repertoire.

“When we first started out, we released ‘Far Side of the World’ and then we only had a small clutch of other songs that no-one had ever heard before”, Robert recalls. “So, it was quite tricky to fill an hour’s slot at a festival with only one song that people knew.

“In those days, we would fill the set out with a lot of covers and try to teach audiences the words of the songs we’d written but not released. I think having the album and the EP out now really helps because it gives us a wider variety of stuff to perform that at least some people know and can sing along to.”

The EP release last year tapped into their affinity with HebCelt when they recorded a live version of ‘Far Side of the World’ featuring the festival audience.

“The noise of the crowd was immense and we knew we could rely on them to put in a good performance”, said Robert.

Playing the festival as headliners will be entering new territory for the band, but it’s something they are comfortable with: “At most festivals, I always think later, headline slots have the best atmosphere as the crowd have been enjoying so many bands all night and just getting louder and louder.

“At HebCelt, however, I’ve often thought that the crowd is pretty much ready to go from the start, so each band gets a great response whether they’re headlining or not.

“Therefore, it possibly won’t be too much different than our previous performances in the main arena, but there’s definitely an added honour to headlining a night at a festival of this size, and a festival that we enjoy so much.”

Tide Lines are currently working on their second album, an experience that has been notoriously difficult for many artists but has, conversely, been more relaxing for them.

“The process has been going well, we’ve got a few songs ready and others in the pipeline”, says Robert. “We’ve been taking it easy and not rushing anything which I think has led to us being generally fairly happy with how the songs are sounding.

“Having said that, I never trust a song until it’s released and I hear proper feedback as to whether or not it is any good. So, I’ll reserve judgement on how the process went until the album is released.”

“Our approach to this second album has been slightly different. I think we felt quite rushed to get the first album out because we had released ‘Far Side of the World’ and started doing gigs before we had any more material ready to put out.

“We very quickly realised that we needed an album of material so that audiences could relate to more than just the one song in our set. So, in many cases, I found the first album process quite pressured.

“This one, on the other hand, has been a bit more relaxed because we’re just taking it as it comes and not rushing anything unnecessarily.”