The Great Escape will be returning to Brighton, on 16th, 17th and 18th May 2013 to kick start the festival season, with super early bird tickets on sale from today. The 2012 event brought the best in new music to the Seaside City's venues for three days and nights and saw 13,000 music fans and 3,000 industry delegates gather for the festival.

Three day delegate passes are now on sale at £80 for three days of talks from music industry professionals, networking opportunities and priority access to core programme gigs. CLICK HERE TO BUY.

Highlights from this year's festival include: Alabama Shakes storming Komedia, Brooklyn's Friends at Horatios on Brighton Pier, UK psychedelic pop quartet Django Django, experimental songstress Grimes, the show stopping Trippple Nippples, the gorgeous Lucy Rose, THAT Skinny Lister street gig, trip-folk band ? [Alt-J], Nils Frahm's spine tingling and tear inducing performance in St. Mary's Church, LA sisters Haim, the captivating AlunaGeorge, Milk Music, hotly anticipated Violet, Aussie's Pond, 17-year old producer Madeon, Savages stand out performance at the Corn Exchange. We Are Augustines "smash-it-up' closing set and two exclusive Red Stripe Street Gigs on the Brighton Wheel.

The convention saw The Great Escape in conversation with Michael Eavis, Brian Molko and Xfm's John Kennedy, and debates on the impact of sync and the art of music supervision, the pros and cons of local music scenes, and live opportunities for new bands across Europe. An expanded networking programme gave delegates direct access to key distributors, agents, bookers and digital innovators, and also included the first ever Digital Pitch Party. There were focused strands on what it means to DIY, and on the state of the music media, plus the return of John Robb's Pop Question Time, the popular Heroes & Villains session, our very own Yearly Music Conference Awards and much more.

2013 line up will be announced at a later date.