Amanda Palmer (Photo by Kyle Cassidy)

The Wave Gotik Treffen 2017 (roughly “Wave Gothic Meeting”), a legendary urban festival, occurs on June 2-5 in Leipzig, Germany, this year. As of today, the festival has confirmed 227 bands performing in several concert halls around the city.

Wave Gotik Treffen is expected to draw about 20,000 people for dark music and arts from the genres of goth, industrial, neo-folk, and others. They will swarm to venues like the AGRA fairground halls, which perhaps hold the largest concentration of goth enthusiasts in the world when they meet there (with a capacity of about 10,000). The festival celebrated its 25th anniversary last year, and it’s going stronger than ever.

Many of the bands performing are no strangers to our shores, and many have performed in DC in recent times, which is one reason Parklife DC photographer Paivi Salonen has decamped to Wave Gotik Treffen to capture some of the key performances for us. Look for her pictures from the festival later in June.

This year, Wave Gotik Treffen hosts bands such as headliner The Mission UK, and an array of other familiar acts like Amanda Palmer (Dresden Dolls) & Edward Ka-Spel (Legendary Pink Dots), Finnish progressive metal band Amorphis, amazing legacy new wave Brits B-Movie, seminal industrial act Cabaret Voltaire, Los Angeles goth duo Drab Majesty, Swedish synthpop duo Kite, and of course synth-folk duo VNV Nation.

Online ticket orders are no longer available as the festival is only days away, but visitors to Leipzig may have luck acquiring tickets at Agra-Messepark (Bornaische Strasse 210, Markkleeberg).

For more information, visit the excellent English language guide to Wave Gotik Treffen at SadGoth.com as well as the official festival website at www.wave-gotik-treffen.de.

Wave Gotik Treffen 2017
Agra Messepark
Leipzig Germany
June 2-5
Various times
120€
All ages?