The Forum Basement
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Welcome to the Forum Basement, our intimate, 50-capacity live music venue in Tunbridge Wells. We showcase a diverse range of talented artists from various genres, from country to punk rock and grunge.
At the Sussex, we have always been dedicated to supporting up-and-coming artists. Our tiny live music venue has had the privilege of hosting renowned acts like Soft Play (previously known as Slaves), Maisie Peters, Yonaka, and The Wytches for their early gigs.
Run in collaboration with the Tunbridge Wells Forum (an independent music venue), the Forum Basement in the Sussex Arms offers a warm and electrifying atmosphere. In addition to hosting gigs, we actively contribute to the live music scene in Tunbridge Wells by participating in events and festivals like Unfest and Local and Live.
Check out our complete gig listing below and book your tickets online today.
Whats On?
Interact with the polaroids to reveal their description, admission price and a booking link.
Pop Punk Night
18/04/2025 - 7:30 pmAdmissison: £9
18+All your favourite pop punk tunes from the 90s and 00s! Come on down and relive your youth courtesy of pop-punk power trio ‘All The Kewl Things’
All The Kewl Things are a hard-hitting pop punk power trio from the Medway towns, covering all the classic 90s/00s anthems from Blink 182, Sum 41, Avril Lavigne and Yellowcard, to Green Day, Finch, Jimmy Eat World and more. They have the added strength of all 3 sharing lead vocals with some sick harmonies thrown in. Shed the weight of adulting for one night and come relive the sound of your youth with All The Kewl Things!
You can expect to hear classics from Green Day, Sum 41, Avril Lavigne, Blink 182 and more
- Support from Weakattheknees
Wrex W/ Drønes & The King Rooks
25/04/2025 - 7:30 pmAdmissison: £8
18+When George Donoghue and Mae Seaton met as perfect strangers on a night out, neither of them could have known how much they needed one another.
But WREX, the band born of the pair’s chance connection some years later, has come to be exactly that: not simply a creative outlet but a need, an urge, a calling, a pure expression.
Together, Donoghue and Seaton make electro-charged alternative rock to turbocharge heartbeats, snap necks and fill both dancefloors and moshpits. Shades of punk, nu-metal, pop and trance collide and coalesce but never clash; a wild explosion of riffs and synths that pulls from influences as diverse as While She Sleeps, Faithless and Linkin Park. This is the WREX blueprint: a fierce, all-enveloping wall of sound with little time for music’s outdated boundaries or conventions; creativity, joy and emotion unbound.
“Working with someone that has as much excitement for making music as Mae is invigorating and inspiring for me,” Donoghue says. “Neither of us has any sort of ego when it comes to making music. No idea is ever off the table. A big part of the WREX ethos is never asking permission – that cuts to the core of both our sound and our DIY sentiment. WREX is ultimately about making art for the sheer joy of creating, and we want to convey that excitement on record and in our live show.”
“WREX is about letting go,” Donoghue says. “It’s a release from everything that’s going on in the world around you, a purge of everything you’re thinking and feeling.”
Drønes
Drønes are a high-energy, four-piece alternative metal band from Kent, UK, known for heavy riffs, dynamic vocals, and fast-paced drums. Since their debut single in late 2022, they’ve made waves in the Kent live scene, reaching two Metal to the Masses finals, playing Margate Rock Festival at Dreamland, and performing at Camden’s iconic Underworld. Now, they’re gearing up to take their hard-hitting live show across the UK ahead of their debut EP release later this year.
The King Rooks
From Folkestone, Kent, The King Rooks are a combination of big riffs, catchy melodies and huge choruses, all combining to create stadium sized rock! For fans of Indie, Post-Punk and Alternative Rock.
Bones Ate Arfa
29/04/2025 - 7:30 pmAdmissison: £5
18+Bones Ate Arfa are a UK psychedelic street punk/desert rock three piece, made up of Bones (guitar), 8 (drums), and Arfa (vocals & bass). They have since gained recognition online and in person from Artists such as Muse, Fred Durst, Isaac Holman, Royal Blood, Tigercub, cool sorcery, Demob Happy, and Bad Nerves.
Featured on Clash, BBC Radio 6, Radio X, Dork, Earmilk, Louder Than War & BBC Intro.
Following in the godlike footsteps of Queens of the Stone Age, Gorillaz, TySegall and Them Crooked Vultures, Brighton’s Bones Ate Arfa will literally eat your bones with its new found sound. Their debut single ‘Asbestos’ roots the band in their desert garage rock sound while bringing in influences of industrial 90s metal and psychedelic punk.
Shtëpi
17/05/2025 - 7:30 pmAdmissison: £8
18+Shtëpi are a five-piece art-punk band with a chaotic live show. They’ve gigged extensively across the south of England, with bands including Geese, Personal Trainer, Lounge Society, and Saloon Dion, and recently longlisted for Glastonbury’s Emerging Talent Competition 2024.
‘Like a melting pot of Viagra Boys and The Birthday Party, Shtëpi’s frenetic searing brilliance was an exhilarating and maniacal sweat-storm’ – Hard of Hearing
‘Refreshing, bizarre, and truly unique’ – NOIZZE UK
‘If your singer is committed to that level of smashing-his-head-against-a-tambourine intensity, then the music better match, and it certainly did’ – No Distance Records
Poppyshow
22/05/2025 - 7:30 pmAdmissison: £6
18+Poppyshow are a 4 piece that play a unique blend of AltRock/Punk/Sweet Beats and gutwrenching/Soul drenching finely honed tunes
Blending catchy pop melodies with genuine raw punk chaos, energy and charisma. Poppyshow have been connecting with audiences up and down the country. GUARANTEED to be remembered after the show. They hold their own in hardcore punk shows, as well as melting hearts with their well written songs that dance their way though thrilling highs and contemplative lows.
‘Trying to deal with life’s big feelings, one song at a time’
Slung
29/05/2025 - 7:30 pmAdmissison: £7
18+Slung feel like they’re meant to be. The mostly-Brighton-based band’s debut single ‘Neurotic’ & “Fire to Burn” is the sound of a tight-knit and driven unit, working together in harmony, with some delicious dissonance thrown in. Citing influences as diverse as MJ Lenderman & Mannequin Pussy to Black Sabbath and Scissor Sisters, Slung’s mish-mash magic conjures a unique and memorable sound, like something you can’t quite put your finger on, but it leaves entranced. Weaving from smooth hypnotic choruses to clattering and cinematic breakdowns, each release from Slung promises an entirely unique listening experience.
Thank
06/06/2025 - 7:30 pmAdmissison: £10
18+Thank
“Mischievous agit-rock philosophers.” Steve Lamacq, BBC Radio 6 Music
“Bringing noise rock kicking and screaming into the volatile 2020s.” JR Moores, The Quietus
“A kind of mad melding of Pissed Jeans and Lady Gaga.” Dominic Haley, Loud and Quiet
“This Leeds band pairs brawny arrangements with furious, bug-eyed vocals.” Bandcamp Daily
In 2024 Thank signed to independent record label Big Scary Monsters, armed with a critically acclaimed new album and a host of upcoming festival slots in the UK and Europe to boot. ‘I Have A Physical Body That Can Be Harmed’ is a brash, satirical and downright stomping full length that combines the raw ferocity of the band’s early work with the ambitious arrangements and electronic experimentation of their more recent output. The end result combines hardware techno squelch, jungle-inspired drumming, synth pop bombast and anarcho-punk spartan aggression, acid-fried and internet-poisoned with a shit-eating grin on its face, landing somewhere akin to The Cure’s ‘The Head On The Door’ if it was remixed by ‘Jenny Death’- era Death Grips.
The Northern Threads
12/06/2025 - 7:30 pmAdmissison: £8
18+The Northern Threads are a young 4 piece Indie Rock ‘n’ Roll band with a gravel-through-honey style sound formed in the slightly grim yet beautiful fells of West Cumbria back in 2016.
Being championed by Huw Stephen’s on Radio 1, Touring with the likes of The Snuts, Twisted Wheel and gigs alongside The Vaccines, Jake Bugg and Scouting for Girls (just to name a few) has brought a lot of welcome attention to their music and live shows. After a successful touring and festival circuit in 2023, The Northern Threads are keeping the ball rolling with their first EP out next year along with a bigger tour next April.