Our Top 5 Drum & Bass Acts to Check Out at Stowaway Festival 2026

Stowaway Festival reaches its fifth edition this summer at Blackpit Farm near Stowe, north Buckinghamshire, running from 31st July to 2nd August. It is an independent, family-friendly event built around electronic music across multiple stages set within woodland and lakeside grounds. The lineup is broad, the setting is low-key, and the crowd tends to reflect both.

For Drum & Bass, the headline proposition this year is clear. Hospital Records! Founded in South London in 1996, Hospital has grown into the world’s largest independent Drum & Bass label. They’re turning 30 this year, and spending the summer celebrating that fact across a run of events that includes the Hospital30 Block Party in Hackney Wick and Hospital30 On The Harbour in Bristol. Stowaway gets its own piece of that programme: a full Hospital Records takeover of the Shake Off stage on Friday evening, with a stack of names confirmed.

Outside that slot, there is at least one more name on the wider bill worth your attention. We’ve gone through the Drum & Bass contingent and put together the acts we think are worth planning your weekend around. Here is what to know before you go…

London Elektricity

London Elektricity aka Tony Colman, is one of the two people who founded Hospital Records. Under the London Elektricity name, he has been one of the defining voices in Liquid Drum & Bass for three decades. His sets tend to double as a survey of the label’s catalogue. At a 30th anniversary event, that function is even more pointed. This is the one to see if you want to understand what Hospital Records built and why it has lasted.

DJ Zinc

DJ Zinc has been active in the Drum & Bass and Jungle scene since the early 1990s. He is associated with the harder, more functional end of the genre, and has moved between Jungle, Garage and Drum & Bass without losing any authority in any of them. His appearance here is going to be a special one as he doesn’t play out very much these days and will serve as a reminder that the Hospital roster has always been wider than its Liquid reputation suggests.

Makoto

Makoto is a Japanese-born, UK-based producer and DJ whose output sits at the soulful, musical end of the Hospital sound. He has been putting out records on the label for well over a decade. His sets are dense with melody and rarely aggressive. At a festival with a broad audience mix, including families, that quality is more useful than it might sound. He’ll be going b2b with Nu:Tone on the day!

Lens

Lens represents the newer end of the Hospital roster. The producer has been building a profile through releases on Hospitality over recent years and also appears on the Hospital30 On The Harbour bill in Bristol. Stowaway is a relatively early festival slot for someone still establishing themselves at this level. Worth watching how the set holds up on an outdoor stage.

Calibre

Outside the Hospital takeover, Calibre is confirmed on the wider Stowaway lineup. The Belfast-born, Dublin-based producer has been one of the most consistently respected names in Liquid Drum & Bass for over two decades, putting out records on his own Signature imprint as well as Soul:r and others. His DJ sets are unhurried and precise. He does not need the Hospital banner to justify his presence here.

BONUS!!!

Skream

Skream is on the Stowaway bill, and his name will mean different things to different people. To a certain generation, he is Oliver Jones from Croydon, one of the architects of Dubstep, responsible for tracks like ‘Midnight Request Line’ and a remix of La Roux’s ‘In For The Kill’ that did more to push the genre into mainstream clubs than almost anything else at the time. He was also one-third of Magnetic Man alongside Benga and Artwork.

That is not what you will get at Stowaway. Skream walked away from Dubstep over a decade ago (although he has recently returned to do the occasional Dubstep set!) and has spent the years since building a second career as a House and Disco selector, playing extended sets under the Skreamizm banner and releasing on labels including Defected. His recent output runs to Tech House and Vocal House, and his festival appearances in 2024 and 2025 have placed him firmly in that world. At Data Transmission, we don’t care! We will seek out and rave it up at any set from Skream… he is a legend!!