Plan your visit for KETTAMA at Reading Festival in Reading, held on Richfield Avenue with his set scheduled for The Gallery stage. If you are considering buying tickets, expect a Sunday performance shaped by his current mix of house, garage, trance and rave energy
KETTAMA at Reading Festival: a hard club pulse in a new festival setting
KETTAMA comes to Reading Festival with his distinctive combination of powerful house rhythms, trance euphoria, garage energy, big chords and vocal motifs. The Galway producer has grown from the club environment into an artist whose sound works just as naturally in front of a large festival audience.
Reading Festival runs from 27 to 30 August 2026 on Richfield Avenue in Reading. It is important to distinguish the start of the festival weekend from the timing of KETTAMA's performance: his festival page currently lists him for Sunday on The Gallery stage. The exact time of his set there has not yet been shown, so it is best to check the schedule again in the festival app or on the current programme before arriving.
For four-day visitors, the weekend begins before KETTAMA's set. Campsites for standard weekend tickets open on Thursday 27 August at 08:00, while the arena opens that day at 17:00. From Friday to Sunday, the arena operates from 11:00 to 03:00.
It is worth securing tickets in good time.
Why KETTAMA is currently so distinctive
Behind the name KETTAMA is Evan Campbell, a Galway-born producer who built his identity without abandoning the rough impact of the club. His music often moves between hard house, garage, trance and techno energy, but what holds it together is not genre labels but a very clear instinct for emotional peaks. In an interview with Mixmag, he himself summed up his strengths as big chords and vocals. That helps explain why his sets can be hard and physical while also being melodically very direct.
The debut album "Archangel", released on 3 October 2025, is important context for Reading. The album has 15 tracks and runs for just under an hour, with collaborators including Interplanetary Criminal, DJ HEARTSTRING, Fred again.., Prospa, Clouds, SΓLV and seantommy. Titles such as "Yosemite", "Fade Away (It's a Feeling)", "Man With a Second Face", "Air Maxes", "I Believe" and "Sort It Out" show how broadly KETTAMA defines the boundaries of his own sound.
"Archangel" opens up space for melody, piano, vocals and slower tension building, but it does not abandon the harder club impact. Beatportal describes it through a combination of hard house, trance, hip-hop samples and emotional weight, giving his repertoire more contrast than a simple sequence of festival drops.
Material defining his 2026 phase
KETTAMA did not stop with the album. During 2026, he continued releasing music that further expands his current repertoire. "Comes and Goes" appeared in May, "Pumpin" with Partiboi69 in June, and "Feels Like Heaven" with Loods and Camden Cox at the end of July. Just two weeks before Reading Festival, "MYSTERY OF RAW" also arrived, a collaboration between Michael Bibi, KETTAMA and Wu-Tang Clan released on 14 August.
"MYSTERY OF RAW" is a particularly good example of the way KETTAMA combines the contemporary club world with musical references beyond a narrow electronic framework. The track uses elements of "Da Mystery of Chessboxin'" by Wu-Tang Clan, and its release followed the first joint B2B set by Michael Bibi and KETTAMA at Tomorrowland during the summer of 2026. It is a very fresh part of his catalogue and a good indication that he is not coming to Reading relying only on material from last year's album.
Among the titles that have become important to his profile in recent years are also "Pretty Green Eyes (Sunset Ibiza Mix)", "Yosemite", "It Gets Better (Forever Mix)", "If U Want My Heart", "Air Maxes" and "Man With a Second Face". It is not possible to state in advance which of these tracks will end up in the Reading set, but they clearly demonstrate the range between the euphoric, melodic and harder club sides of the KETTAMA sound.
What kind of performance can be expected without inventing a setlist
With DJ artists such as KETTAMA, it makes little sense to lock in the repertoire in advance. There is currently no confirmed setlist for Reading, so it is more useful to look at his current performance style.
Mixmag's profile from the period around "Archangel" describes an artist who had an intense festival summer, an Ibiza residency and major B2B performances behind him. His Cover Mix for the same publication moved from house and garage material towards harder, rave-oriented selections, alongside his own tracks such as "Man With a Second Face" and "Fade Away (It's a Feeling)". This suggests a set in which KETTAMA does not treat his own discography as a closed catalogue, but mixes it with a selection of music by other producers.
The audience can expect three key elements:
- high energy and a rhythm designed for dancing, with a strong foundation in house, garage, techno and trance textures
- big melodic and vocal moments that break up the harder part of the set and give it an emotional arc
- a DJ approach in which his own tracks, current releases and club selections can change rapidly without a traditional concert structure
This is particularly attractive to audiences following contemporary house and the UK club scene, but the melodic elements do not require complete knowledge of the discography. Long-time fans can follow the development towards "Archangel" and the current singles, while a wider audience will more easily recognise powerful vocals and major rhythmic transitions.
The Gallery changes the context of his performance
KETTAMA is scheduled at Reading on The Gallery, a new stage introduced for the 2026 edition of the festival. Organisers describe it as a covered and immersive stage with LED screens and production that encompasses the entire space. This is an important difference compared with a traditional open-air festival stage, especially for an artist whose music depends on rhythmic pressure, precise transitions and a visually controlled club atmosphere.
The Gallery is not exclusively an electronic stage, so KETTAMA there sits between a major festival performance and a more enclosed club atmosphere. The precise capacity of the stage itself has not been published in the sources used. Reading Festival retains an overall capacity of 105,000 visitors, and the new stage layout is part of the biggest change to the arena in the festival's 37-year history.
For KETTAMA's type of performance, that contrast matters: a large festival crowd outside, and inside a space designed as a complete audiovisual environment. To get a place closer to the stage, it is worth arriving before his set.
Ticket sales for this event are currently under way.
Reading as a festival base
The Richfield Avenue location is one of the practical advantages of Reading Festival. Reading railway station is approximately a 15 to 20-minute walk from the festival site, and the town has direct rail connections with London Paddington and numerous other parts of the United Kingdom. For international visitors, the direct bus connection between Reading Station and London Heathrow Airport is also useful.
During the festival, shuttle buses also run between Reading Station North, the town centre and the Thames Side Promenade area beside the festival entrance. If you are arriving by car solely to drop off or pick up passengers, Richfield Avenue is not a place where this is permitted. Hills Meadow Car Park is designated for friends and family, from where the site can be reached on foot along the Thames or by a free shuttle boat.
Cars with the appropriate parking access use designated festival car parks. Green Car Park is located in Kings Meadow and is connected to Green Gate by a free boat, while White Car Park in Mapledurham is intended for certain weekend arrivals. Travellers should not improvise by using local streets around Richfield Avenue because temporary traffic measures and stopping restrictions are in force during the festival weekend.
Reading Borough Council expects particularly heavy traffic on Thursday 27 August, when the largest part of the weekend audience arrives. For four-day visitors who are camping, it therefore makes sense to plan the journey in advance.
Practical things before entering the arena
A maximum of one A4-sized bag per person is permitted in the arena, and bags may be searched on entry. One sealed bottle of water or non-alcoholic drink of up to 500 ml may be brought in. Alcohol for personal use is not permitted in the arena.
For the weekend audience there is another practical difference: with a weekend ticket it is possible to leave and re-enter the arena and campsites, while a day ticket does not allow re-entry after leaving the arena. The campsites remain open until noon on Monday 31 August, so four-day visitors have enough time for an organised departure after Sunday's programme.
Before setting off, it is most useful to check:
- the current time of KETTAMA's performance at The Gallery
- the route from Reading Station or the selected car park to the appropriate entrance
- traffic restrictions and the location for dropping off or picking up passengers
- rules for bags, bottles and items that cannot be brought into the arena
- the return plan after Sunday's programme, when taxi queues can be long
Who will find KETTAMA one of the most interesting choices of the weekend
If you are coming to Reading primarily for guitar headliners or the pop programme, KETTAMA can be a good entry point into the contemporary club side of the line-up. His sound works with a clear impact, major emotional transitions and direct melodies.
For fans of house, speed garage, trance and modern rave sounds, the appeal is even more obvious. "Archangel" strengthened his identity as an artist, while the series of releases from 2026 shows that he is not relying on a single successful phase. "Comes and Goes", "Pumpin", "Feels Like Heaven" and "MYSTERY OF RAW" push his catalogue further at a time when he is simultaneously performing at major festivals and in club formats.
The biggest unknown is exactly how he will structure the Reading set. No specific track, guest or production trick should be promised: he arrives with fresh releases, an album that expanded his range and a new covered stage strongly focused on the visual experience.
If KETTAMA is among your main reasons for coming, plan your Sunday around The Gallery and leave enough time to enter before his set. Places fill up quickly.
Sources:
- Reading Festival - KETTAMA artist page, performance day and The Gallery stage
- Reading Festival - festival dates, arena and campsite opening times, entry rules, transport, parking and shuttle options
- Pollstar - description of the new The Gallery stage, changes to the festival arena layout and Reading Festival's overall capacity
- Mixmag - KETTAMA profile, his musical approach, festival period, "Archangel" and the character of his DJ sets
- Beatportal - context for the album "Archangel", collaborators and the release's genre range
- Apple Music - discography, release date and track listing for the album "Archangel" and current releases from 2026
- DJ Mag - "MYSTERY OF RAW", collaboration with Michael Bibi and Wu-Tang Clan and release on 14 August 2026
- Steel City Dance Discs - "Pumpin" with Partiboi69 and release date
- Visit Reading / Reading Borough Council - traffic measures, expected arrival volumes and organisation of drop-off, pick-up and parking during the festival weekend