Summer Sessions 2026 - Talk To Her (IT) + more to come

The Eleven Empire Summer Sessions continue the tradition of one of the most distinctive event series in our region, which has created a unique platform for contemporary music beyond industrial constraints since 2013 at the Rockhouse Salzburg, through a consistent focus on quality, diversity, and independent curation. In the 2026 edition, several carefully selected acts will once again perform live on a single evening, including the first confirmed band, Talk To Her from Padua, whose dark, incisive sound condenses post-punk, new wave, and electronic elements into an intense engagement with themes such as identity, desire, and alienation.

Talk To Her (IT) + more to come
Summer Sessions

What began as a small bastion for raw-sounding garage rock has developed over the past fifteen years into an indispensable forum for a vibrant, multifaceted contemporary music scene, where artistic boldness and subcultural diversity are not only tolerated but consistently promoted. This ambition to position itself beyond conventional music industry logics and instead create an open, experimental space both curatorially and aesthetically remains characteristic of the Eleven Empire project at Rockhouse Salzburg.

The Summer Sessions mark a special highlight in the annual calendar: they bring together several carefully selected acts in one evening, whose collective mention is more than just a simple listing of bands. Rather, it reflects a curatorial attitude that spans global underground electronics, post-punk frictional surfaces, to rhythmically unconventional layering and narrative visions. In the past, these sessions have been characterized by boundary-breaking: artists such as HHY & The Kampala Unit, Descartes A Kant, and Morena Leraba have opened up different perspectives on contemporary music beyond common categorizations by intertwining afro-electronic rhythms, psychedelic textures, and a generally transcultural performance sensitivity.

In both their structure and self-understanding, the Summer Sessions refer to a fundamental principle of Eleven Empire: radical openness to musical innovation, recognition of sound as a collective field of existence, and the assertion of an independent space within the cultural fabric of Salzburg. This attitude has continuously solidified in the years leading up to 2026, not least through the presence of numerous acts that have taken on more significant positions later in their careers but had their first major performances in the city early on within the framework of Eleven Empire.

Thus, the 2026 edition not only represents another chapter in a series but also the ongoing validity of a curatorial ethos that seeks to connect avant-garde attitudes, underground sensitivity, and cultural independence – inviting the audience not only to consume this attitude but to engage with it intellectually.

Talk To Her

Talk To Her is an Italian band from Padua, whose sound encompasses a wide spectrum from post-punk to electronic music, as well as new wave and alternative rock. Their introspective themes – suffering, desire, alienation, and the search for identity – evoke the emotional intensity and darkness found in post-punk icons like Killing Joke or more modern acts like Editors, as well as the electronic melancholy conveyed by Depeche Mode in many of their works.

In 2018, they released their EP "Home," which laid the foundation for their later development with a dense, atmospheric mix of wave, new wave, and post-punk influences. In 2020, the album "Love Will Come Again" followed, which not only delved deeply thematically but also brought the band positive feedback and a growing fanbase. After the release, the band intensified their live activities, performing at renowned festivals such as Wave Gotik Treffen, Sinner’s Day, and Post Punk Strikes Back Again – events closely linked to the European post-punk and dark wave scene.

With their second LP "Pleasure Loss Desire" released in 2025, Talk To Her ventures even further into darker, sharper soundscapes. The previously more emotionally passionate themes give way to alienation, fear, and existential coldness, with both the sound and vocals appearing colder, more uncompromising, and occasionally more aggressive. While the wave influence remains palpable, a post-punk-driven sound aesthetic dominates, mixed with strong influences from post- and alternative rock of the late 1990s and early 2000s – a development that will surely appeal to fans of bands like Editors or Killing Joke, as well as followers of modern dark wave acts like She Past Away.