Luxor, Cologne, Germany 7th Sep. 2026
Ecca Vandal - “Looking for People to unfollow Tour 2026” - Special Guest: Freddy Forbidden
An early autumn evening with temperatures over 30 degrees is made to be spent in crammed spaces like the Luxor (/ironyoff). However, the chance to see one of the breakthrough artists of the year in an intimate setting like this was totally worth it.
Freddy Forbidden
FREDDY FORBIDDEN is an artist hailing from Newham, East London, whose unique sound fuses raw grime flow with Indie Rock melodies, driving Punk energy, and nostalgic bedroom Pop textures. His artistic identity and personal history took a dramatic turn after a near-fatal 2018 hit-and-run incident left him rebuilding his life, sparking a resilient, rebellious creative drive that extends beyond music into high-fashion modelling and poetry.
Drawing heavily on his East London heritage, his sonic identity balances British Rap street-level grit with sharp guitar riffs and introspective alternative arrangements. His discography features high-octane releases including his standout EP ‘New World Order’, driven by explosive singles like ‘Maniac’, alongside self-released tracks that showcase his multi-genre approach to modern underground music. www.freddyforbidden.com
Music & Performance
When FREDDY FORBIDDEN stepped onto the stage at 8:00 PM, he immediately discarded any traditional boundaries between performer and audience. Without hesitation, he walked straight down into the middle of the crowded floor, surrounding himself with the sweat and heat of the room. As his tour DJ paced behind him, constantly filming the entire set with a handheld camcorder to capture the raw chaos, the Londoner flashed a wide grin and declared, “You have to get through me to get to ECCA.”
Positioning himself as the evening’s ultimate warm-up instigator, he added, “I’m your personal trainer - I’m here to get your heart rate up!” His intense, physical delivery, constant crowd engagement, and relentless movement turned the sweltering club into an immediate fitness session, successfully breaking the ice and leaving the room thoroughly primed for what was to hit.
Ecca Vandal
ECCA VANDAL is an Australian artist born in South Africa to Sri Lankan Tamil parents who fled civil war, a rich heritage that heavily informs her fierce independence and genre-defying musicality. Her signature sound is an explosive fusion of Punk Rock, alternative Hip-Hop, Industrial electronic beats, and Hardcore vocal dynamics.
After bursting into the global consciousness with her acclaimed 2016 debut EP ‘End of Time’, she dropped her powerful self-titled LP ‘Ecca Vandal’ in 2017, featuring hard-hitting collaborations with heavyweights like Dennis Lyxzén and Jason Aalon Butler on ‘Price of Living’. Her discography has expanded with standouts like ‘Battle Royal’, ‘White Flag’, ‘Future Heroine’, and ‘Broke Days, Party Nights’, leading up to her sophomore album ‘Looking for People to Unfollow’. www.eccavandal.com
Music & Performance
Taking the stage at 9:00 PM, ECCA VANDAL came out guns blazing with her opening track ‘Eyes Shut’, instantly setting a frantic tone for the night. Having spent significant time commanding massive festival stages across the globe, and opening for heavyweights all around, the band seemed to have taken in all that energy and decided to release it within the intimate, confined geometry of the Luxor, creating an immediate pressure-cooker effect.
The momentum surged higher with ‘Came Here For the Loot’, which hit with an incredible kinetic impact that felt like it physically squeezed the air out of the lungs of everyone in the room - a massive step up from the studio recording. During ‘Bleed But Never Die’, the performance transformed into a powerful community moment as ECCA VANDAL invited all the women in the audience to move up to the front of the pit before welcoming them up onto the stage to share the space, turning the track into an unbothered, joyous dance-fest.
Towards the end of the set, she candidly confessed to the audience that she had been feeling ill, apologizing that her voice was not entirely where she expected it to be and explaining that there would be no encore. Wrapping up precisely after an hour, the sheer intensity delivered over the time left no one feeling cheated. By the time the final chords rang out and the show ended, there wasn’t a dry t-shirt left in the club - just the lingering hum of pure, unadulterated live music, and the craving for a breeze of fresh air and hydration.
Setlist
01. Eyes Shut
02. Came Here For The Loot
03. Do It Anyway
04. Bleed But Never Die
05. Closing Ceremony
06. Cassettes, Lies And Videotapes
07. Then There’s One
08. Deadweight
09. Ghosts
10. Bleach
11. Did A Little More To Forget
12. Molly
13. End Of Time
14. Vertical Worlds
15. Dance In Debt
16. Cruising To Self Soothe
17. Sorry! Crash!
Pictures by Christian Beyermann
