Bristol's Forwards festival to tackle the city's issues

Image sour this, Antonia Cross

A new festival in Bristol will tackle the city's 'important' issues alongside its musical offering.

Artists such as Charli XCX, The Chemical Brothers and Jamie XX are due to perform at the Forwards festival in the Downs this weekend.

But the event will also feature talks on topics including the housing crisis, sex positivity and addiction support.

Curator Antonia Cross said that it was about "making these conversations accessible to a wider audience".

Ms Cross, who works for the charity for the homeless Caring shelter in Bristol, added: "We really wanted the opinions, ideas and conversations that are happening right now in Bristo l to be truly cutting edge."

Festival organizer Tom Paine said the panel discussions, which will also cover the food poverty, climate change, racism and "breaking the ceiling on music lessons", were "issues we felt the city needed to address".

Image source, Plaster Communications

Mr. Paine, founder of Team Love, who also runs the Love Save music festival the Day said, "With the explosion of the festival industry, there are a lot of purely commercial events out there.