Red Bull Culture Clash 2025 returns to London after almost a decade away
Four crews of MCs compete in what was once the UK's flagship IKEA store
A day festival with a difference is returning to London in 2025: Red Bull’s Culture Clash.
This is an event inspired by Jamaican sound clashes. A quartet of crews face off with their most inventive and crowd-pleasing sets.
Back in 2016 Culture Clash was held at London’s O2 Arena, and has moved across the US and Europe since. In 2025 it’s heading to a new venue, Tottenham’s Drumsheds, on March 8. This huge space opened up in 2023, having previously been an IKEA store.
Red Bull Culture Clash will take place in Drumsheds’s Room X, which has a capacity of 15,000. It’s going to be quite the party.
The crews have already been announced too. Native Soundsystem featuring Teezee, Homegrown feat. Jyoty, Spice Army feat. Spice and Voice of the Streets feat. Kenny Allstar will compete.
Culture Clash features “the scene’s top DJs, MCs and artists who will face off in a four-round battle, dropping massive records, unreleased tracks, and an exciting roster of special guests and surprises, all in an effort to be crowned kings and queens of the clash,” reads the event’s listing.
The competition is split into four stages, and each crew has up to 15 minutes in these to get the crowd going. Here’s how it pans out:
- Temperature’s Rising: the warm-up stage
- The Selector: judged on tune selection
- Sleeping with the Enemy: each crew has to adopt the music style of another
- The Decider: final round, last chance to show off bangers
The entire 2016 Culture Clash has been posted on YouTube, for a flavour of the event. It saw Wiz Khalifa and Taylor Gang, UKG Allstars and Eskimo Dance lose out to Mixpak. Previous guests at the event have included Stormzy, Lethal Bizzle and Damian Marley.
General admission tickets are available to order now, for around £65. Tickets for pre-5pm entry are a little cheaper, at around £50. Doors open at 4:30pm, and it’s all over by 11pm.