As you all probably know, us folks down at Vive Le Rock are big fans of Stone Valley Festivals which take place in a number of locations and dates over the summer - Stone Valley South was just a couple of weekends back and starred Buzzcocks, The Dualers, Ferocious Dog and Smalltown Tigers among many others and the Midlands version had The Damned, Sham 69, Peat and Diesel and a recently reformed Soup Dragons entertaining the hordes of music lovers.
Vive Le Rock have been guests at Stone Valley North over the last couple of years and had an absolute ball - the line-up was a terrific mixture of the old, the new and the downright weird and filled a Wickerman-sized hole in the festival calender for your esteemed scribes!
Unfortunately, Stone Valley North in Durham has been beset with a few logistical problems this time around, (much of which has been caused by a long-planned change of location and the hellish weather this last winter causing drainage and safety issues) and rather than cancel, it’s been amalgamated (kinda) with Northern Kin Festival which is run by the very same people. It remains at the new location of Thornley Hall Farm in Durham but the later date of 9-11 August has facilitated it remaining viable as work has now been completed.
The Stone Valley North line-up has been affected by the date change as many of the originally booked artists have touring commitments but the big hitters like Hawkwind, The Waterboys, Alabama 3, Ferocious Dog, Cast and When Rivers Meet should see a good time had by all.
There’s also the always-entertaining Urban Voodoo Machine, Billy Bragg, Dreadzone, Elaine Palmer and festival perennials Big Country among others to wet your whistle. The Bay City Rollers are on Saturday, too….
With decent ticket prices, a cracking friendly atmosphere and reasonable food and drink in the arena as well as ample camping, Northern Kin is a wee bit bigger than Stone Valley but should be just as good a weekend.
