Organizers of Yellowknife’s wintertime Still Dark Festival have named the first wave of performers for the 2026 edition.
Still Dark will take place at various venues in downtown Yellowknife from February 5-8, 2026, featuring folk, country, hip-hop, metal, rock and punk.
Among acts announced on Friday is Sun Starved, a five-piece unit that played at Steadily Deadly Fest in May and is described as “Yellowknife’s premier metalcore band.”
Sun Starved is “trying to make up for the lack of sunshine by being aggressively loud about it,” a press release stated.
Another Yellowknife act set to play Still Dark 2026 is HYFY, a four-person band that plays “unlistenable music about intractable issues.” HYFY won the 2025 Main Stage Showdown, earning a spot in this year’s Folk on the Rocks festival lineup.
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Łı́ı́dlı̨ı̨ Kų́ę́ First Nation’s Jonathan Antoine, who leads a four-piece band from Fort Simpson and Fort Providence, will bring a blend of rock, soul and country to Still Dark. The band is described as delivering “a sound that is both grounded in the North and universally resonant.”
This year, Antoine played at Folk on the Rocks and Old Town Ramble and Ride in Yellowknife, Hay Days in Hay River, the Open Sky Festival in Fort Simpson and the Fireweed Festival in Fort Smith.
Rounding out the list of NWT acts announced on Friday is Stacie Arden Smith, an Indigenous singer-songwriter and self-taught guitarist from Yellowknife.
Organizers said Arden Smith’s music is “deeply personal, reflecting her journey and desire to inspire others through authenticity and connection.”
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Joining the 2026 Still Dark Festival from outside the territory are:
- Skinny Dyck, an alt-country artist based in Lethbridge, Alberta;
- Dump Babes, a psycho-pop band from Saskatoon named rock artist of the year at the 2025 Saskatchewan Music Awards; and
- punk-metal group Iron Tusk from SikSika Nation in Alberta.
Still Dark organizers are releasing the full lineup for the 2026 festival over two waves. They said the second wave will be revealed in mid-December.
The upcoming festival, which was “inspired by the northern tradition of caring for one another during our long, harsh winters,” is also set to feature an art installation.
The inaugural Still Dark Festival took place in January and February 2025 and featured more than 20 acts from across Canada.
Early-bird passes for the 2026 festival are available on the Still Dark website.
