60 festivals happening in July 2017

Local
1) Cheltenham Music Festival
*July 1-16

Cheltenham
Price: various, lots free
www.cheltenhamfestivals.com/music
Family friendly
Theatre
Film
Recommended
One of the granddaddies of the circuit and, is it approaches its 73rd outing, still one of the finest. While many classical-leaning gatherings are determinedly snooty affairs, this one is all about twinning quality with accessibility. Thus, a fine education and outreach programme, a composer academy (wherein participants have their compositions workshopped, performed and recorded) and a fortnight comprising more than 650 performers playing 60+ events, including a strand of events aimed at ages four and up. High profile offerings include Monteverdi from I Fagiolini and Academy of Ancient Music, ballet in the Everyman Theatre, Vaughan Williams’ Sea Symphony in Gloucester Cathedral, Bryn Terfel, the CBSO and the Hallé. Plus talks and workshops, film screenings, and excursions into dance, world music, jazz, theatre and regular guided walks through the town.

2) Grillstock
July 1-2

Bristol
Price: £50 w/e
www.grillstock.co.uk
Food
The UK’s biggest BBQ fest – aka Vegfest’s nemesis – wherein dozens of teams battle it out to become meat grilling champs and attendees sample their wares, swig craft beer, regret entering
hotdog eating contests, and watch TBA bands. As a guide, last year featured The Fratellis and The Stranglers.

3) 2000Trees
July 6-8

Upcote Farm, Glos
Price: £100 w/e
www.twothousandtreesfestival.co.uk
Slaves are the big news at this year’s 5,000 capacity event, topping a line-up also including Nothing But Thieves, Jamie Lenman and Pulled Apart By Horses.

4) Hazy Days 
July 6-7

Tropicana, Weston-Super-Mare
Price: £73 w/e
http://www.hazydaysfestival.com
Taking place at Weston’s Tropicana Hazy Days hosts Fun Lovin’ Criminals, Newton Faulkner, Reef, Sophie Ellis-Bextor and Neville Staple Band as the festival’s headliners. Supporting them over the two days are Gaz Brookfield, Meadowlark and Future Dub Orchestra.

5) Boondocks

July 7-8

Sherston, Wilts
Price: £49 w/e
www.theboondocksfestival.co.uk
Family friendly
Altogether smaller than last year – tickets are limited to 500 – with 16 bands playing the across a brace of stages over two days, held on the former SherstonFest site.

6) Frome Festival

July 7-16

Frome, Somerset
Price: various, lots free
www.fromefestival.co.uk
Literature
Art
Theatre
Family friendly
Recommended
Not just a magnet for the terminally pleased with themselves, Frome punches well above its weight when it comes to its annual fest, with roughly 30,000 gathering for a programme of music, theatre, open artist studios, tons of talks, loads of kids’ stuff, and the usual annual food feast curtain-raiser.

7) Nailsea & Backwell Beer & Cider Festival
July 7-9

Nailsea & Backwell RFC
Price: £8 adv day tickets
www.applefest.co.uk
More than £70,000 has been raised here for local charities over the years, and it really doesn’t take much effort to add to the altruism, gaining access as you do to a range of 100+ beers and ciders. You’re then free to sway along to, variously, live music, craft activities, games and bouncy castles.

8) NASS
RECOMMENDED
July 7-9

Royal Bath & West Showground, Shepton Mallet
Price: £109 w/e
www.nassfestival.com
Recommended
Family friendly
When NASS staged the BMX World Championships last year it was the first time they’d been held in the UK for 28 years. This year they’re back again. Such is the festival’s global position in street sports world, with skateboarding and street art also well to the fore. On the music front, the big news is a headline show from Method Man and Redman in what is expected to be the hip-hop duo’s only UK show of the year. Pendulum, Kano, Sigma, and David Rodigan also star.

9) Priddy Folk Festival
*July 7-9

Priddy, Somerset
Price: £90 w/e
www.priddyfolk.org
Family friendly
Genuine community fest, this, with everything from local church maintenance to primary school music tuition, village green drainage to equipment for the Priddy toddler and pre-school group to thank for its beneficent distribution of funds. Which is all very well, but of no great use to the incoming festival goer if the event itself isn’t up to snuff. Happily, it’s a proper-job folk delight, offering demonstrations of the type of trades from which so much of the original songs drew their narrative thread, such as coracle making and blacksmithery. There’s an oft-sells-out archaeological walk around Priddy’s Nine Barrows, too, plus children’s festival offering Juggling, storytelling, puppetry, and so forth. And, amid the concerts and ceilidhs, you’ll find the likes of Fake Thackray, Faustus, Flook, Mawkin, Jim Causley, the Firepit Collective and Kitty Macfarlane.

10) Bristol Pride Day
* July 8

Bristol
Price: free
www.pridebristol.co.uk/day
Recommended
Family friendly
Green
Last year’s post-march debut in the amphitheatre and Millennium Square was a splendidly successful affair, with rather more room to stretch out than at the old Castle Park site. Returning this year come the bustling markets, family area with loads of play activities, and extended hours for the dance and cabaret stages. Still more announcements to be made on the performing side as we go to press, but to date the list of main stage acts includes Sonia, Republica, Dr Meaker, Avec Sans, Saara Aalto and Union J. In other news the team are introducing a new Friday night concert fundraiser and Saturday’s after party at the O2 Academy looks particularly fine, featuring as it does the best-sung and most esoteric covers band around – Charlotte Church’s Pop Dungeon – together with Horse Meat Disco. And remember Pride Day is but the main event of Pride Week itself (June 30-July 9), including the return of the award winning film festival at Watershed, Pride Dog Show (July 1), a drag version of Murder She Didn’t Write at the Old Market Assembly (July 4), and a comedy night with Bethany Black, David Mills, Jayde Adams and guests (July 6).

(Credit Anna Kalin)

11) Bristol Psych Fest
July 7-8

Crofters Rights & Trinity, Bristol
Fourth outing for this sumptuous banquet of mind-expanding audio, featuring psych and noise acts from the UK and beyond. Highlights include Bristol faves Spectres, who we booked to headline the Bristol24/7 stage at last year’s Brisfest, as well as The Shivas, Kill West, Dead Rabbits, Abjects and Swedish Death Candy. Best of all – in our humble opinion – are the mighty Sex Swing, whose self-titled debut album was easily among 2016’s most exhilarating sonic trips.

12) Folk on the Lawn
July 13-16

Tintern, Wales
Price: free after opening night
www.folkonthelawn.com
Recommended
Opening night features a must-pay performance from a TBA headliner (last year it was the incredible strings and storytelling of Robin Williamson), while Friday-Sunday sees lower profile acoustic/roots acts gathering in the shadow of glorious Tintern Abbey at no charge.

13) Once Upon a Time in the West Festival
July 13-15

West Ashton, Nr Trowbridge, Wilts
Price: £75 w/e
www.outwestfestival.co.uk
Never knowingly under-partied, this fest is big on klezmer, ska, cowpunk, swing, bluegrass, pretty much anything that will get – and keep – an audience moving. Only its fourth outing, but the organisers have plenty of previous helping helm the likes of Endorse It, Bath Fringe and Glastonbury.
Pronghorn, The Guns Of Navarone, Mad Professor and 3 Daft Monkeys are among the line-up.

14) Broadcider Cider & Music Festival
July 15

Near Ilminster, Somerset
Price: from £10 adult
www.fuelledbycider.com
New one-dayer offering limited camping and bands including Skimmity Hitchers, Palooka 5 and Surfin’ Birds.

15) The Godney Gathering
July 15

Garslade Farm, Glastonbury, Somerset
Price: £22.50
www.thegodneygathering.com
Family friendly
It might only be a single-dayer, but it doesn’t hang about: 75+ acts across six stages, with musical headliners including The Darkness and Dub Pistols. Kids get their party and disco tent and much else besides.

16) Bristol Harbour Festival
*July 21-23

Bristol
Price: free
www.bristolharbourfestival.co.uk
Family friendly
Art
Theatre
Green
Food
Recommended
Of all the many-splendored events on the local calendar, if someone was bland enough to demand a single one be awarded be awarded the epithet The People’s Festival, this would surely be it. Partly because it is, by a distance, the biggest – close to a quarter of a million hit the harbourside over the course of the weekend – but also because it’s a rare beast that brings together residents from the inner suburbs, the outer fringes, and all points in between. Two miles of entertainment await them, with the stretch from Cumberland Basin to Castle Park hosting three music stages (not counting the affiliated ents in Thekla, Louisiana, Grain Barge), dance village, tons of food stalls, and Cirque Bijou’s programme of acrobatics, comedy, aerial performance, dance, street theatre and games. That’s before you take into account all that’s happening out on the water: huge flotillas of out-of-town boaters that drop by, trips out on all of the M Shed-moored heritage fleet, boat races, rescue displays, etc.

(Credit Colin Rayner)

17) Scrumpy & Western Extravaganza
July 21-22

Fernhill Farm, Somerset
Price: £39 w/e
www.fuelledbycider.com/scrumpy-western-extravaganza
West Country as it gets: a covered barn hosts a cider-centric affair headlined by The Wurzels and supported by some of the acts they’ve inspired, including Skimmity Hitchers and the Surfin’ Turnips.

18) WOMAD
*July 27-30

Malmesbury, Wilts
Price: £210 for four days
www.womad.co.uk
Family friendly
Recommended
Green
There are thems who like the familiar and there are thems who like to explore. Festivals for the former are ten-a-penny (nb. figure of speech – may actually cost more than ten-a-penny), events for the latter altogether more rare. And none – truly, none – offer a more extensive range of fresh sounds than this place. Among the first wave of acts announced, for example, are the Pol Pot-defying Khmer Rouge Survivors. Their debut album ‘They Will Kill You, If You Cry’ was released last year to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Cambodian genocide, and the group have never played their transcendent South-East Asian blues outside of their native land. Until now. Piles of names remain TBA at press time, but further confirmed appearees include South African vocal grandees Ladysmith Black Mambazo, genial dub poet Benjamin Zephaniah, Brazil’s Gilles Peterson-beloved Nomade Orquestra, gypsy band kindred spirits Zhou Family Band from China and Zanzibar’s splicers of Arabic and African traditions, Rajab Suleiman & Kithara. Throw in a gracious arboretum in which to relax, a steam fairground, tons for kids to do, workshops in musical styles you’ve yet to hear, the magnificent Taste the World stage (musicians interviewed while cooking up traditional recipes, before passing the fruits of their labour into the crowd), a genuinely friendly atmosphere, and you’ve got, for our money, the most exhilarating, soul-firing festival on the circuit.

19) Farmfestival
* July 28-29

Bruton, Somerset
Price: £79 w/e
recommended
www.farmfestival.co.uk
Very much one of the more imaginative smaller-scale festivals, and right on our doorstep. For evidence, see a bill pulling together the brilliant-but-properly-eclectic likes of afrobeat legend Tony Allen (paying tribute to one of jazz drumming’s most distinctive messengers, Art Blakey), Squarepusher’s Shobaleader One and shadowy electronica master Actress alongside the formerly-of-this-parish This Is The Kit and the entirely cosmic London Astrobeat Orchestra. All staged in an idyllic organic farm that is largely downhome and proud of it: “Pretty much everything you will see at Farmfest will have been hand-made, re-appropriated, designed, painted, built by one of the team, a collaborator, or one of our many volunteers.”

20) Upfest
* July 28-30

Bristol
Price: free
www.upfest.co.uk
Recommended
Family friendly
Art
Long since Europe’s largest street art and graffiti festival, the ninth running of this splendid fest will be the biggest yet with the festival boundaries due to be extended to accommodate more artists than ever before. No word on the exact number, but with 300 spray can virtuosi flying in from all across the globe in 2016, it’s going to be a lot. Expect upwards of 30,000 crowding into Bedminster and Southville to see how the neighbourhood is going to look over the coming year, with lots more fun for the kids promised, too, alongside art workshops, live music and affordable art sales.

21) Sequences
July 29th

Motion, Bristol
Price: From £20
www.sequences.co.uk
RECOMMENDED
The soundsystem blowout returns for a second helping after a successful debut last summer. The event makes use of Motion’s indoor and outdoor spaces, and the stages are programmed by Critical, The Blast and Bandulu, which means drum & bass, grime, garage and more. This year’s artists include Chase & Status, Flava D, Elijah & Skilliam, Mefjus, Kasra, Kahn & Neek, Sir Spiro and Amy Becker.

22) Thai & Multi Cultural Food Festival
July 29-30

Millennium Square, Bristol
Price: £4 day ticket
www.desythai.com
Straightforward and accurately named affair promising dancing, Thai boxing demo, costume parade, Miss Thailand and Miss international UK Beauty Pageant, music, food, etc.

National

23) New Forest Folk Festival
July 5-9

Nr Romsey, Hants
Price: £80
www.newforestfolkfestival.co.uk
Family friendly
Recommended
Good value fest, given that we’re talking 80 quid for the full days and the main headliners are Albert Hall-filling Show Of Hands, Acoustic Strawbs, Mad Dog Mcrea, and the magisterially fronted Jacqui McShee’s Pentangle. Low level folk legend Richard Digance also puts in his regular appearance, and quite right too – it was his suggestion to stage a folk fest on a farm overseen by the same family for six generations. The site is surrounded by trees (guided stroll through the woods is available), a stream runs through it and, for its size, is about as home-spun as it gets: handbuilt/self-designed stage, home-cooked food in the cafe, family members running the merch stand, etc.

24) Blissfields
July 6-8

Winchester, Hants
Price: £100 w/e
www.blissfields.co.uk
Like every modern boutique gathering, Blissfields is centred on a theme – this year, ‘The Bizarre’ – and goes the extra mile by having a festival quote: “The distance between your dreams and reality is called action”. The line-up includes The Cinematic Orchestra, Metronomy, Lady Leshurr and Sundara Karma.

25) Boogie Woogie Festival
July 7-9

Sturminster Newton, Dorset
Price: £65 approx.
www.ukboogiewoogiefestival.co.uk
Only the dates are confirmed as we go to press, but this festival’s formula has been cast as fixedly as the music it convenes. Offering heavy twelve-bar rhythm on the left hand, melody on the right, come performers from across the globe, with lots of free street action complementing the paid-for behind doors stuff.

26) Cornbury Music Festival
July 7-9

Great Tew Park, Oxfordshire
Price: £200 w/e
www.cornburyfestival.com
The Pretenders are playing! That apart, things are as expensively beige as the Chipping Norton surrounds, with a couple of hundred quid putting you in sound wave distance of Bryan Adams, Kaiser chiefs, Tom ‘Keane’ Chaplin, Jools Holland, Jack Savoretti and Imelda May.

27) Glas-Denbury
July 7-9

Nr Newton Abbott, Devon
Price: £55 w/e
www.glas-denbury.co.uk
Literature
Art
Theatre
Family friendly
Loads for the kids here, with a musical bill big on plaintive singer-songwriters and solemn folkies, plus the likes of Mr B the Gentleman Rhymer and own properly party-bringing RSVP.

28) Rock Oyster Festival
July 7-8

Nr Wadebridge, Cornwall
Price: £35
www.rockoysterfestival.co.uk
Food
It might have moved across the river from last year’s site but the midsummer food celebration is still powered by oysters and Cornish pride (see, for instance, the laying of ‘Kernow Springs’ – hot tubs to anyone else). Expect a Food Academy teaching the ways of fishing, foraging, etc, a big old programme for kids, and music from a line-up including Showhawk Duo, Land of the Giants, The Electric Swing Circus and Backbeat Soundsystem.

29) Kew The Music
July 11-16

London
Price: from £40
www.kewthemusic.org
Wondering just what to buy your worst enemy for their birthday? How about an evening at one of these hamper-humping bore-a-thons, where the lumpen acts being pronounced rillyrillygreatactually are, in order of headline night, Passenger, Razorlight (plus the Bluetones and Reef) Haçienda Classiçal and James.

30) Latitude
July 13-16

Southwold, Suffolk
Price: £197.50 w/e
www.latitudefestival.com
Recommended
Family friendly
Theatre
Literature
Green
One of the most family-friendly festivals on the circuit, with all manner of youngster-friendly ents well beyond the usual play park/storytelling options. We’re talking hands-on forensic science, activities from Suffolk Wildlife Trust, genetics lab, archaeology, etc. With an invitation to go swimming in the lake, too, this is relaxedly fine fare indeed. No word on this year’s musical line up yet, but 2016’s 6 Music-redolent bill should give you a fair idea of what to expect: The Maccabees, The National, New Order, Father John Misty, John Grant, Courtney Barnett, Laura Mvula, et al.

31) Beat-Herder
July 14-16

Ribble Valley, Lancashire
Price: £150 w/e
www.beatherder.co.uk
Note to all festival organisers: we know it’s become the done thing, but there are still a significant number of would-be festival goers who’d run a mile from any event insisting on a ‘theme’. For some of us, forced jollity is no jollity at all. If you’re struggling to come up with one, it’s better and easier not to bother. Because though we could be wrong, we’re not sure Beat-Herder really have their heart in theirs: “Anything beginning with a D… anything at all… dinosaurs, ducks, dice, dominoes…” Desperate? Or dub, given the line-up: Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, Adrian Sherwood, Dub Pistols, and the equally bass-loving likes of Sleaford Mods, Toots & The Maytals and David Rodigan.

32) Edinburgh Jazz & Blues Festival
July 14-23

Edinburgh
Price: various
www.edinburghjazzfestival.com
A year shy of its 30th anniversary, the posh bit of Scotland brings in jazz- and blues-leaning acts from across the globe. No line up info at press time, so we can only note that last year saw appearances from the sonically polite likes of the Average White Band and Jools Holland.

33) Lovebox
July 14-15

Victoria Park, London
Price: £105 w/e
www.loveboxfestival.com
Co-founded in 2002 by Groove Armada, the line-up is broader than its dance-centric early days, if still pretty beats-oriented. Thus, the likes of Frank Ocean, Jess Glynne, Rag‘n’Bone Man, Solange, Jamie xx, Chase & Status, Annie Mac and Andy C.

34) Swanage Jazz Festival
July 14-16

Swanage, Dorset
Price: £88 w/e
www.swanagejazz.org
A big, misty-eyed year for a festival circuit perennial, as Swanage Jazz fest presents its 28th and final event: “the Festival Board took the decision to end the Festival reluctantly, recognising that age and illness has caught up with us,” they announce. Fittingly, they’re going out in style, with old school New Orleans/Dixie fare augmented by the rather more modern likes of Zoe Rahman, Art Blakey’s former saxophonist Jean Toussaint, Gilad Atzmon, our own Andy Hague and Darius Brubeck.

35) Tolpuddle Martyrs Festival
July 14-16

Tolpuddle, Dorset
Price: £35 w/e
www.tolpuddlemartyrs.org.uk
Recommended
Literature
Commemorating the six Tolpuddle farm workers transported to Australia for having the audacity to form a (perfectly legal) union? It’s fair to say there have been festivals formed for less. The TUC organise this one, laying on a colourful mix of banner processions, political discussions, wreath laying, music, poetry, kids’ stuff with the Woodcraft folk, a Methodist service and, almost certainly, Billy Bragg. Note, too, that the traditional Sunday Rally Day is open to all and free.

36) Secret Garden Party
July 20-23

Abbots Ripon Estate Cambridgeshire
Price: £190 w/e
www.secretgardenparty.com
Green
Literature
Art
Theatre
Smugly annoying at the best of times, the fest has shifted from superficially to seriously offensive
this year with a website ‘boasting’ the tagline “It’s not stalking if you really love them”. Which, to be honest, rather put us off finding out any further details.

37) Chagstock
July 21-22

Whiddon Down, Devon
Price: £90 w/e
www.chagstock.info
Family friendly
Recommended
“The Best Little Festival in the South West,” reckons Adrian Edmondson, who knows a little about these things. Could be the stage looking down into a sweeping valley and up the other side, could be the profits given over to the Devon Air Ambulance and Water Aid, could simply be the generally relaxed environs. Headliners this time out are Soul II Soul and The Shires.

38) Deer Shed Festival
* July 21-23

Topcliffe, North Yorks
Price: £125 w/e
www.deershedfestival.com
Family friendly
Recommended
Art
Literary
Theatre
An altogether stronger line-up than you might expect from a 6,000-strong affair, with Teenage Fanclub, Kate Tempest, The Divine Comedy, Arab Strap, King Creosote, Honeyblood, Cabbage, Jesca Hoop, Ibibio Sound Machine and Teleman the pick of the bill. The Literary Tent is back, ready to host the brain-speaking likes of Brix Smith Start, Hollie McNish, and Shadow Home Secretary, Andy Burnham. In similar manner, new to 2017, comes a splendid innovation: the Bedtime Stories Tent. Very possibly the most family friendly festival of the year, you’ll also find all manner of sciencey stuff to wrap your grey matter and hands around, gardening, movie-making, BMX workshops, old school playground games, comedy, theatre, and on. All this in a glorious site, about which organisers say: “We thought it might be nice if we let you explore it, build dens, learn about its diverse plants and trees and essentially get away from it all.” The epitome of small but perfectly formed, then.

39) Nozstock
July 21-23

Bromyard, Herefordshire
Price: £125 w/e
www.nozstock.com
“The most down-to-earth, family-orientated festival I have ever performed at. I like the vibe.” Thus, Jurassic 5’s Akil the MC after the group’s show here last year, evidencing the fact that, although it’s grown a fair amount, Nozstock retains the feel of an event that began as a meeting of family and friends. Among those dropping by this year are Seasick Steve and the Happy Mondays.

40) Tramlines
July 21-23

Sheffield
Price: £42 w/e
www.tramlines.org.uk
The return of the mighty All Saints is the main draw this year, on a bill also featuring the likes of The Libertines, Toots and the Maytals, The Coral, Loyle Carner and Metronomy. A distinctly metro affair, it’s held across a plethora of venues and outdoor stages, threaded together with street theatre, dancers, workshops, etc.

41) Truck Festival
July 21-23

Nr Abingdon, Oxfordshire
Price: £115 w/e
www.truckfestival.com
Family friendly
20th edition for an event shortlisted for Best Small Festival for the last four years running at the UK Festival Awards. Self-described as “an anti-major” – food takings, for instance, are passed along to the local Rotary Club – the bill is still pretty high profile: The Libertines, The Vaccines, Franz Ferdinand, Slaves, Maximo Park, Hot 8 Brass Band, Jagwar Ma, Loyle Carner, Sundara Karma, British Sea Power, Cabbage, etc.

42) Cambridge Folk Festival
July 27-30

Cambridge
Price: £167
www.cambridgefolkfestival.co.uk
Family friendly
Inaugurated over half a century ago at the height of the British folk boom, welcome to the daddy of the modern folk fest. Only a rather shallow first wave of acts announced as we go about our compiling, with guest curator Jon Boden the figurative playground football captain pointing and saying “You… you… yep, you” to Oysterband, Jake Bugg, Lau and Hayseed Dixie.

43) Camp Bestival
July 27-30

Lulworth Castle, Dorset
Price: £197.50 w/e
www.campbestival.net
Family
Green
Wherein Josie and Rob Da Bank welcome revellers to glorious Lulworth Castle. Designed as a determinedly family affair, right down to the old school British holiday camp atmosphere, the first big announcement for kidular entertainment is a showing from the cast of School of Rock – The Musical! (Their exclamation mark.) Biggest attraction for the grownups will surely be Brian Wilson playing ‘Pet Sounds’ in its entirety, with the bill also set to include Mark Ronson, Madness, All Saints, Holly Johnson, Leftfield, Skream and David Rodigan.

44) Kendal Calling
July 27-30

Kendal, Cumbria
Price: Sold out.
www.kendalcalling.co.uk
Recommended
Green
Theatre
Literature
Film
Art
Stereophonics, Manic Street Preachers, Brian Wilson bring forth all of ‘Pet Sounds’, Tinie Tempah and Franz Ferdinand are among the highlights.

45) MTV Crashes Plymouth
July 27-28

Plymouth Hoe
Price: £27.50 for both days
www.mtv.co.uk
The blameless port receives its annual buffeting from Anodyne Central, with no word at press time on the names to be awkwardly pronounced from autocue. Should it be a useful guide, last year’s event brought forth Rudimental, Example, Tough Love and Jess Glynne.

46) Port Eliot Festival
July 27-30

Port Eliot, St Germans, Cornwall
Price: £172.50 w/e
www.porteliotfestival.com
Recommended
Literature
Food
Roughly speaking, think of this as Hay Fest-on-Sea. Beautiful site, multi-faceted programme, sadly under wraps as we write. When the covers come off, expect to find a discerning line-up of authors, musicians, foodies, etc.

47) Standon Calling
July 27-30

Standon, Herts
Price: £147 w/e
www.standon-calling.com
Green
Theatre
Art
Returning to the grounds of a 16th century Hertfordshire manor house comes summer party-themed fest in the company of Orbital, Clean Bandit, Gary Numan, Slaves, British Sea Power, Cabbage and our very own Idles.

48) Y-Not Festival
July 27-30

Matlock, Derbyshire
Price: £109.50 w/e
www.ynotfestivals.co.uk
The beauteous Peak District plays host to a fest that apparently began life as a gathering of young folk attending an overspilling house party. A rather larger affair these days, set to welcome the likes of Stereophonics, Two Door Cinema Club, The Vaccines, Clean Bandit and Jake Bugg.

49) Bimble Bandana
July 28-30

Brighton
Price: TBC
www.bimblebandada.com
Green
As we lovingly assemble our guide, all is quiet in the Bimbling camp beyond confirmation of the dates and another appearance from our rapidly ageing, uniformly tiresome friend the ‘secret location’. We can, though, lean on our experience to tell you that somewhere near Brighton there will be a 100% solar-powered festival offering yurt and tipi hire, healing area, hot tubs, piano sunlodge, and so forth.

50) Indietracks
July 28-30

Ripley, Derbyshire
Price: £79 w/e
www.indietracks.co.uk
Recommended
Family friendly
Like indie pop? Like steam trains? Then this might just be the fest for you, hosted as it is by the Midland Railway Centre and featuring wall-to-wall pop goodness. As a rule. No word on the line-up at the mo, but in previous years the craft workshops, real ales, etc, have been soundtracked by the likes of Saint Etienne, Teenage Fanclub, Camera Obscura, The Go! Team, Gruff Rhys, Allo Darlin’ and The Vaselines.

51) Ramblin Man
July 28-30

Maidstone,Kent
Price: £150
www.ramblinmanfair.com
Classic rocking fest, with an awful lot of chugging guitars and synchronised ‘axe’ swinging to get through before you get to the good bit. So: Saxon headline Friday night, highly misleadingly named Extreme are top dogs on Saturday, and the lower ranked acts include Big Boy Bloater, The Quireboys, Kenny Wayne Shepherd and Joanne Shaw Taylor. And then, bringing the curtain down on the whole caboodle on Sunday: the magisterial ZZ Top! Unsurprisingly, there’s no such thing as a Sunday day ticket…
July 28-30
Kozfest
Uffculme, Devon
Price: sold out
www.deviantamps.com
Full name: Kozmik Ken’s Psychedelic Dream Festival. Thus, a music bill featuring the likes of Soft Machine and System 7, a community bonfire, ‘sacred space’, and so on.

52) Leopallooza
July 28-30

Bude, Cornwall
Price: £100 w/e
www.leopallooza.com
11th outing for a fest held in a farm in lovely North Cornwall, a multi-stage affair including a big old dance area. No word on the line-up as we write, but last year was headlined by Crystal Fighters and Kodaline.

53) Steelhouse Festival
July 29-30

Ebbw Vale, Gwent
Price: £85 w/e
www.steelhousefestival.com
The 7th year of the Welsh International classic rock festival. Featuring Rival Sons,
Skindered and Saxon, along with Last In Line, Monster Truck, British Lion, King King, Inglorious, Wayward Sons plus many more!

54) Alnwick International Music Festival
July 29-Aug 5

Alnwick, Northumberland
Price: free
www.alnwickmusicfestival.com
It’s more than 40 years since the folk song and dance fest began bringing in performers from across the world – Mexico, the US, Italy, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Belarus, Estonia, Bulgaria, South Korea, more – for a splendid blur of sound and movement. No word on the 2017 programme as we head for press.

International 

55) Bilbao BBK
July 6-8

Bilbao, Spain
Price: 110€
bilbaobbklive.com
Depeche Mode, The Killers, Phoenix, Fleet Foxes, Two Door Cinema Club, Justice and The 1975 will be among those playing four main stages to 40,000 people, the whole thing going down in a splendid mountain-surrounded hilltop location.

56) Exit
July 6-9

Novi Sad, Serbia
Price: £107 w/e
www.exitfest.org
Properly heavyweight affair in scale, comprising as it does 20+ stages set inside an 18th century fort looking down from on high onto the blue Danube. Chances are you’re more likely to travel for the general ambience than a musical bill featuring the likes of Liam Gallagher, Jake Bugg and Rag‘n’Bone Man.

57) NOS Alive
July 6-8

Lisbon, Portugal
Price: inc camping from 146€
www.nosalive.com
10th year for this capital affair in Portugal, with 50,000 gathering to behold the splendid likes of Savages and Depeche Mode, plus The Weeknd, Foo Fighters, The xx, Ryan Adams, Alt-J, Warpaint, The Kills, Phoenix, Kodaline, Wild Beasts and Parov Stelar.

58) Ruisrock
July 7-9

Ruissalo, Finland
Price: 155€
www.ruisrock.fi
Predominantly Scandianavian bill gathered for this, one of Europe’s oldest rock fests, held on an exquisitely beautiful Finnish island.

59) Fib
July 13-16

Benicassim, Spain
Price: 149€
www.fiberfib.com/en
23rd year for a beach-side, water park-adjacent festival boasting a pretty darn high profile music line up, including Kasabian, Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Weeknd, Foals and Ride.

60) Soundwave
July 27-31

Tisno, Croatia
Price: £129
www.soundwavecroatia.com
Another big old sunfest on the Dalmatian Coast, this one bringing forth the likes of Laura Mvula, The Pharcyde, Roy Ayers, Gilles Peterson, GoGo Penguin, Roni Size and Horse Meat Disco.