Following another hugely successful year for Kendal Calling, tickets for the 20th anniversary of the much-loved Northern festival have gone on sale and are already selling out rapidly.
2024 marked the 19th consecutive sold-out year for the festival, and you can bet your house on Kendal Calling 2025 tickets disappearing before you know it as well.
With more than 40,000 people making their way into Lowther Deer Park in the Lake District every 24 hours over the course of the four-day music and arts festivals, it’s one of the biggest and best festivals in the region.
We certainly enjoyed ourselves the last two years, put it that way.
To better put it into context for you, when broken down to the numbers the festival sees the town suddenly inflate to the third biggest town in the whole of Cumbria thanks to the hordes of new punters, families and returning fans that travel to the Lakes simply for the festival.
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Dubbed by many as a ‘mini Glastonbury of the North’, the organisers have already built a remarkable reputation for themselves, attracting huge names over the years.
From Bastille, Elbow and Snoop Dogg; Catfish and the Bottlemen, Blondie, Chase and Status; Public Enemy, Calvin Harris, Tom Jones and countless others, Kendal Calling boasts some serious pedigree and is only set to go bigger and better from its 20th birthday – a huge milestone for any festival.
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Viral moments from this year’s legendary lineup included Declan McKenna’s iconic set on Thursday’s opening night, Manchester’s very own Corella jumping into the main stage crowd and, of course, Gary Neville delighting crowds with a DJ set some amusing on-stage antics for us Mancs.
It’s moments like these that explain exactly why tickets sell out every year and why they’re already being snapped up not even a week after the 2024 edition wrapped up.
It also needs reminding that the festival is about much more than just the music.
Following this year’s festival, Kendal Calling’s co-founder Andy Smith said: “From Paolo Nutini to Gary Neville, Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds to Dick and Dom, packed out fields for Sugababes and The Reytons to the legendary Barrioke, woodlands adventures and swashbuckling parades… even a special visit from the Fury family backstage.
“The history books continue to be written, and 19 years in this could, quite possibly, have been our best one yet! As festival-goers set off for another year and we return the fields to the wildlife who call it home, we want to extend an enormous and heartfelt thank you to each and every one of you who makes Kendal Calling the magical place that it is!
“The revelry, the community and the unutterable feeling of joy span every corner of our site and that is all down to you!” They’ve made sure to keep repaying that gratitude too by freezing ticket prices and even, with payment plans also available from as little as £15 per month.
So, with tickets for 2025 and their 20th-anniversary festival already on sale, we can only urge you to give it a go. Taking place from 31 July-3 August, adult early bird passes with camping for the full weekend start from £184.95 including fees.
You can find the full list of options HERE. We hope to see you in the fields next year and you can read our full review of Kendal Calling 2024 down below.
Featured Images — The Manc Group/Abbie Jennings (supplied)
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Government to introduce price cap on ticket touts and launch consultation on dynamic pricing
Danny Jones
The UK government are finally set to install a price cap on re-sale tickets for touts and open an official consultation on the growing trend of dynamic pricing.
If you’ve bought a ticket to a live music show over the past year or so, you’ll have noticed that ticket prices in general are on the up – particularly if purchased from a reseller, in which case you might have paid through the nose for the privilege.
Not only does ticket touting remain a prevailing problem in the industry, with tonnes of tickets for big shows, especially, being snapped up in bulk or by bots and listed for re-sale before you’ve even added them to your basket, but the advent of this new dynamic pricing lark has made things even harder.
You only have to look at the controversy and chaos surrounding Oasis’ reunion tour, which ultimately saw some fans paying significant amounts more for practically the same ticket just a few days later in what many dubbed as ‘fraud’ and even ’emotional blackmail’.
Justin Timberlake at Co-op Live Manchester was one of countless gigs where ticket prices fluctuated. (Credit: The Manc Group)
Tackling resellers head-on
Knowing full well that people will go to extreme lengths to try and see the musicians and artists they love so dearly – in some cases being backed into a corner as the final figure displayed on the screen when they checkout suddenly jumps up – the modern ticketing industry is severely broken.
With all that in mind, the government are now looking to enact more stringent measures on resellers, by announcing a new price cap on tickets put back up for sale which is set to be introduced (hopefully) in the very near future.
Targeting sites infamous for inflating re-sale costs such as Viagogo, StubHub and others, the bill published on Friday, 10 January proposes a price cap of face value plus 10-30% but no more, with an obvious aim to keep that number as low as possible.
According to the current figures, touts reportedly cost music fans alone more than £145 million in extra re-sale fees when purchasing tickets every year – a frankly ridiculous sum. There will always be tickets ending up on re-sale sites, that’s unavoidable, but a price cap could seriously improve the situation.
The Manc music legends themselves claim they had little control over the situation.
Down with dynamic pricing
Labour, who were voted into power back in July, are also set to try and combat dynamic prices, which essentially sees gigs and events set people back more or less depending on how the popular ticket sales have been up to that point, market trends and general demand. An initial review was called for last year.
Put simply, the more people want to attend a gig, platforms like Ticketmaster feel they are able to jack up their margins even after the initial price point has been established. The European Commission has been investigating these methods since September 2024.
Although it is still unclear as to the exact time scale of when these changes will come in, Labour MP Chris Bryant told NME that although they are still in the early stages, it is “now just a matter of how the government takes action.” And that’s where you come in.
The consultation is also crucially public, with the calling for people to submit their evidence on current pricing practices and continue engaging in the discussion throughout the progress. New Year’s Resolution: let’s curb ticket touts as much as we possibly can.
The AO Arena is giving away FREE tickets for a year to celebrate 30 years in Manchester
Daisy Jackson
The AO Arena has announced it’s giving away free tickets for a year to celebrate its 30th anniversary in Manchester.
The iconic music venue has welcomed the biggest names in the world in its three decades, with millions of us making memories for life inside its huge space.
And now you could win VIP tickets for an entire year, simply for sharing those memories with the AO Arena.
Fans who submit their old photos, videos and tickets will be in with a chance to win tickets to all the shows coming up in 2025 – which already includes massive gigs like Kylie Minogue, Katy Perry and Busted vs McFly.
AO Arena wants to dig deep into ‘first gig’ nostalgia territory, using fan-submitted snaps to build a collection of Manchester memories.
Were you in the same room as Taylor Swift, did you party like it was 1999 (because it was) with Spice Girls, did you cry over the sight of Gary Barlow or cry laughing with Peter Kay?
Britney Spears and Beyonce are among the names who have performed at AO Arena in its 30 year history. Credit: Supplied
Whatever your AO Arena memories are, you can share them before the end of the month to be entered into the competition to win VIP tickets for the year.
One overall winner picked at random will get the ultimate VIP experience, including access to a premium suite and The Beautiful North, as well as access to The Mezz with panoramic views of the main stage.
The 30th birthday campaign has been inspired by Adele’s monumental When We Were Young performance at Glastonbury, and all these memories will be projected around the arena before every performance.
You can submit your footage and enter the competition via the AO Arena website HERE.
Danny Jones -
8th August 2024 
