What Does a “Live Band” Experience Actually Feel Like? When you book Punch The Air, you aren’t just hiring musicians; you’re securing a high-octane live production that transforms a standard room into a festival-level event. Unlike “backing track” performers, every note you hear from us is 100% live—raw, energetic, and tailored to the room’s atmosphere in real-time.
The “Live” Difference:
Real Interaction: We don’t just stand behind microphones. We engage with your guests, reading the dance floor to decide exactly when to transition from a classic indie floor-filler to a modern chart-topper.
Pro-Grade Live Audio: We use a high-end digital sound system and a state-of-the-art electronic drum kit. This allows us to deliver that “big venue” punchy sound even in smaller venues with strict sound limiters.
Non-Stop Energy: Our live sets are designed to be “all killer, no filler.” We specialise in the indie-rock sound that gets people off their seats and keeps them there until the very last chord.
Live Band
Book a live band for an event
Being a professional function band ‘Punch The Air‘ can adjust our set list repertoire on the spot to make sure guests stay on the dance-floor the whole night long. Giving dancers more of the type of music they clearly want to listen to. As opposed to changing genres just for themselves. We are always thinking about what you want. It’s never about what’s best for us, it’s always about what’s best for you. Shouldn’t all party bands be like this?
Indie Rock Cover of Shotgun originally by George Ezra by Punch The Air party band
‘Punch The Air‘ live band perform a superb mix of indie rock covers and also massive chart hits from modern day, through the early 2000s, into the 90’s. Also from the 80’s, 70’s, 60s and 1950’s. All your guests will already know and love all of the live music in our repertoire. These are tried and tested songs we’ve been performing live for many years now (Having formed in 2013). And with over 100 positive reviews under our belts you can be assured we are the right choice for your special event. We know when to slow it down a little and when to ramp it back up again for maximum effect. Our live function band will give you the best high energy performance around. All the while smiling back at you and your guests putting in 100% effort throughout the event. Do you like Coldplay, The Killers, Amy Winehouse and The Beatles? Then we’re the live act for you.
You've Got The Love by Florence + The Machine cover by Indie Rock Cover Band 'Punch The Air'
The term festival band is quite the generic pairing of words that don’t actually mean one thing specifically. It could mean ANY band of ANY genre that performs live on a stage to ANY numbers of an audience. But to us it means something a lot different. By FESTIVAL BAND we mean a band that can whip a very large crowd up into a screaming frenzy. A band that play the right type of music for the masses attending. Huge singalong hits by classic chart pop music by artists who have stood the tests of time. Big chanty chorus’s and loud stomping tunes. Plus tonnes of audience participation. This is exactly what it’s like when you hire a festival band called ‘Punch The Air‘. So get in touch with band leader Andrew Starkey ASAP to check on price and delivery.
Festival Band
Book a festival band
Our festival band started way back in 2013 and have continually upped the game of what you should expect from a professional band. We love performing at festivals and know how to handle audiences of any size small of large. We’ll play big singalong songs by artists like The Killers, The Beatles, Amy Winehouse, Blink 182, Coldplay, Oasis and more. We’ll perform something for absolutely everyone there including a great array of indie rock cover band music. All punters will know every single song we’ll play live. During our on stage performances we’ll sometimes stop playing completely and get the whole crowd to sing the song back to us. We really can engage with the audience this well. Also we’ll make sure we get lots of photos and video to share with you. When you hire a band for a festival make sure you hire Punch The Air.
Punch The Air Band - Best Of Festival Performance live to thousands of people
Punch The Air headlining The Big Gig at Paulton Rovers, Bristol. Festival goers had sent Andy over their phone footage so he combined it into one video.
How to book A Festival Band 'Punch The Air' Indie Rock & Pop (Festival Goers Phone Footage Comp.)
Outdoor or indoors.
It doesn’t matter whether you’re planning an indoor festival or an outdoor festival. We’re the ideal function band for your event. Sound checking at festival performances is not a problem for us. All we need is to line check instruments just before our stage time. We just need to make sure we can hear our guitars, drums and vocals well enough. Then we’ll then be off playing live in a matter of minutes. This can help to keep the live music running nearly continuously without any breaks or down time. If you need us to fully sound check prior to guests arriving then thats not an issue either. Contact to hire a live band for a carnival, gala, fete or fair.
Are you hosting a wedding reception on a farm? Or are you a farmer or a son or daughter of a farmer looking to hire a farm wedding band? Then ‘Punch The Air‘ are the live wedding entertainment professionals you’ve been searching for. We have performed on many, many farms since our inception way back in 2013. We absolutely love a good farm style wedding as they are always so much more relaxed than those hosted in hotels and manors. We’ll perform massive singalong dance-along songs by artists like Coldplay, The Killers, Kings Of Leon, Blink 182, Oasis, Fountains Of Wayne, Wheatus and more for you and your other half. Then for your guests we’ll play tunes from The Beatles, Amy Winehouse, Bryan Adams, Neil Diamond, Elvis and more. You’ve got the best of both worlds with us handling your live entertainment. Contact band leader Andy Starkey now for price and availability for your farmers wedding.
Farm Wedding Band
Hire a Farm Wedding Band
Whether you have a barn for us to perform live in or a marquee, tipi or tent we’ll make sure all your guests are up dancing all night long to our indie rock classics and pop tunes from old to new. Why not decorate your countryside wedding venue with rustic features or go super modern and contemporary in your farmhouse or cottage. Forget about agriculture, crops, mucking out and milking for a day and enjoy your wedding day in style on your home farmyard. We’ll bring along everything needed audio wise and we’ll even throw in free tablet DJ services too. That’s quality Yamaha speakers and subwoofer, LED lighting for us and you too. You don’t need to think about anything else sound or lighting wise when you book a professional wedding band like Punch The Air.
Farm Wedding Band 'Punch The Air' - 'You've Got The Love' (Florence + The Machine Cover Version)
find a band for a wedding on a farm
First Dance
Check out our live video above at Katie & Stuarts farm wedding. They chose You’ve Got The Love by Florence + The Machine as their first dance. As this classic tune is part of our repertoire we performed it live for them. Whether you’re a young farmer or an older farmer you’ll love our high energy live performances.
Wedding On A Farm
Having a wedding on a farm barn
Hosting a wedding on a farm means you’ll always have plenty of space for guests. Also room outdoors for old-school party games, gin horse boxes, street food vendors and much more.
Camlad Barns Wedding Band 'Punch The Air' performing live on Emma & Edward's big day.
What’s also great is that you can chose to work to your own relaxed schedule. As opposed to having to work to a hotels strict set of timings. You’ll find you’ll have a more much relaxed wedding on a farmyard. Also it means we can crank the volume up of our PA a touch louder so you have more of a festival style wedding.
Wedding On A Farm Band 'Punch The Air' performing Shotgun by George Ezra live cover version in 4K
If you are looking for information on a wedding refund coronavirus policy, Punch The Air have always been upfront about exactly how they handle this. When Covid-19 restrictions prevented weddings from going ahead across the UK, we promised every client a full 100% deposit refund with no argument and no small print. That promise applied whether you needed to cancel entirely, reschedule to a date we could not cover, or scale back your plans due to a reduced budget. We built our reputation on being a band you can trust, and that means being honest about money when things go wrong. Contact band leader Andy to check on fee and availability.
Refunding Refund Coronavirus
This page sets out our wedding refund coronavirus policy in full. Whilst pandemic restrictions are no longer in place, we feel it is important to keep this information available. It reflects the values we continue to apply to every booking we take today. Our indie rock wedding band has always put clients first, and that will never change. If you would like to understand how we handled rescheduling your wedding during difficult times, this page explains it in full.
Camlad Barns Wedding Band 'Punch The Air' performing live on Emma & Edward's big day.
When the pandemic first began to affect weddings throughout the UK, professional wedding band Punch The Air made an immediate and unconditional wedding refund coronavirus promise to every client: your deposit would be returned in full if you were unable to go ahead because of legal restrictions. No arguments, no small print, no delays. We understood the heartbreak that couples were experiencing across Lichfield, Birmingham and the wider Midlands, and we felt it was simply the right thing to do.
Our position was straightforward. You should never lose money because of something entirely outside your control. Couples who had already paid deposits to secure their date were protected completely. If we could not agree a new date that worked for both parties, the deposit came back. If we were already booked on your rescheduled date, the deposit came back. If you decided not to reschedule at all, the deposit came back. That was the promise, and we kept it every single time.
Booking With Confidence During the Pandemic
For couples who were at the early stages of planning during Covid-19, we wanted to make it easy to go ahead and book rather than put everything on hold indefinitely. Our wedding refund coronavirus guarantee meant you could secure your date with an indie rock wedding band that genuinely had your back. If restrictions were still in place as your date approached, the refund promise applied. If everything had returned to normal and the party could go ahead as planned, brilliant. Either way, you were not taking a financial risk by booking.
This approach helped a huge number of couples across the Midlands and beyond to keep their wedding plans moving forward during a deeply uncertain time. We worked as a flexible wedding reception band and were willing to accommodate every reasonable change of plan that our clients needed. That is the standard you can still expect from us today as an indie rock cover band that has been performing at weddings and parties for well over a decade.
Three Situations Where Our Wedding Refund Coronavirus Policy Applied
To make things as clear as possible at the time, we set out three specific scenarios in which a complete coronavirus wedding deposit refund would be issued without question.
You had a booking with us and needed to reschedule due to Coronavirus restrictions, but we were not available on your new date. Full deposit refunded.
You decided to cancel your wedding entirely due to the outbreak and were not making alternative arrangements. Full deposit refunded.
You needed to scale back your wedding significantly and no longer had the budget to include live entertainment. Full deposit refunded.
This was not a complicated policy. It was just a fair one. The wedding industry as a whole faced an extraordinary period of disruption, and we chose to face it by standing behind our clients rather than hiding behind contract terms. As a highly recommended wedding band with a strong reputation built over many years of performing at venues across Staffordshire, Cheshire, the East Midlands and beyond, protecting that reputation meant protecting our clients first.
Indie Rock Wedding Band 'Punch The Air'
Changing Your Wedding Party Band Date
In the majority of cases during the pandemic, what couples actually wanted was not a coronavirus wedding refund but a new date. They had spent months choosing their venue, their photographer, their flowers and their entertainment. They had found us, a top rated party band that was going to make their evening unforgettable, and understandably they did not want to start that whole search again from scratch. Rescheduling was always our first suggestion, and we worked hard to find new dates that suited everyone involved.
We handled changes for couples planning weddings at venues across Shropshire, Worcestershire, Warwickshire, Derbyshire and the East Midlands. The pandemic affected couples everywhere, and we did our best to support as many of them as we possibly could.
If you are planning a wedding now and want to understand more about how we approach flexibility and date changes, you can read our guide on rescheduling a wedding and what to consider. Then get in contact to discuss your event with us directly.
As an indie rock party band that has been performing since 2013, Punch The Air brings the same energy, reliability and care to every event. Whether you are booking years in advance or need a band at shorter notice, you can do so knowing that your investment is protected and your evening is in good hands. We cover venues across Staffordshire including Lichfield, Tamworth, Cannock, Rugeley and Burton upon Trent, as well as the wider Midlands, North West and beyond.
Indie rock cover band ‘Punch The Air‘ bass player (And lead singer) Andrew Starkey is a massive fan of The Smiths. Andy Rourke is one of Andy’s favourite bass players ever and one of the reasons Andrew Starkey picked up the bass guitar and plays a Fender Precision. Along with Morrissey, Johnny Marr and Mike Joyce, The Smiths were a huge influence on Andy growing up. So Andrew decided to help others out who want a bass guitar lessonBarbarism Begins At Home to learn a bit of the funkiness of Mr Rourke and so created this instructional video. To book an indie rock cover band contact Andy for price and availability.
Bass Guitar Lesson Barbarism Begins At Home (The Smiths)
Barbarism Begins At Home - Bass Guitar Lesson (The Smiths Andy Rourke)
You can download & print out the bass tab to Barbarism Begins At Home to make it easier to play along to the above video.
Right click on each of the below and select ‘Save Link As’ to download the bass mp3 to Bass Guitar Lesson Barbarism Begins At Home to practice against. Each mp3 is repeated multiple times to save you rewinding.
This is quite a tricky bass guitar line to master and it’s not one for complete novices. That said though, if you keep at it, start very slowly and over time build it up. You will nail it eventually. It’s as much about building up muscle memory on your bass guitar as much as anything else. Play it multiple times a day, then play it without looking over at your hands at all. When you’re not overly thinking about it anymore, that’s when you know you’ve got it licked. Do you know what bass guitar Andy Rourke from The Smiths is playing in the image below?
In comparison check out the video below of what this song would have sounded like if Andy had just played root notes throughout. What a different vibe and VERY boring eh?…..yawn
What if Andy Rourke just played root notes on Barbarism Begins At Home? #boring
Bass Guitar Lesson Barbarism Begins At Home The Smiths Andy Rourke
Andy Starkey is also available to give bass guitar lessons in and around the Lichfield, Staffordshire area. Find out more about what Andy can teach you on the Lichfield Bass Guitar Teacher page. Andy works on his own unique way of teaching which doesn’t involve learning notes or theory. It’s just about working out how to play your favourite bass lines and enjoying yourself. What could be a better way of learning how to play an instrument than from someone who performs live for a living? Are you a big fan of Andy The Smiths too?
