Moovin Festival, one of the country’s best-loved festivals, is set to take over the beautiful countryside in Etherow Country Park this August bank holiday weekend.
The festival was once considered a real hidden gem but is now a proudly independent and welcoming staple for thousands every summer.
There’s a line-up of returning favourites and hotly-tipped newcomers, all performing in the ‘adult playground’ where quirky stages are built into open-sided cow sheds and festival-goers relax on actual bales of hay.
The site itself features canopies of trees, lakes with busy waterfowl, and a breathtaking gorge.
This year, Moovin Festival will take place between 25 and 27 August at Compstall’s ‘udderly unique’ Whitebottom Farm.
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Located just 30 minutes from both Manchester and Sheffield, this place is a real northern gem.
Moovin Festival is also on the longlist for a Festival of the Year Award at the inaugural Nordoff and Robbins Northern Music Awards – you can vote for it here.
Moovin’s picturesque countryside location in the village of Compstall is actually only 15 minutes from Stockport, and 30 minutes from Manchester.
Those who are driving should use postcode SK6 5HH, and follow the signs to the car park. The cost is £15 for a day or £25 for the full weekend, paid in cash.
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For drop offs you can either get dropped off in the Festival Car Park, SK6 5HH, or Etherow Country Park Car Park, George St, Compstall, SK6 5JD.
The walk to the festival site is approximately 25 minutes from the Festival Car Park or 20 minutes from Etherow Country Park Car Park, and is clearly signposted from both locations.
A shuttle bus will run between the Festival Car Park and the festival site, costing £1 each way,
The nearest train stations are Marple and Romiley. Stockport train station is also nearby with buses every 15 minutes.
Moovin Festival 2023 line-up and headliners
This year’s line-up includes headline performances from Laurent Garnier, house music mainstay Toddy Terry, plus local legend Mr Scruff.
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The bill also includes Mungo’s HiFi feat Eva Lazarus, David Holmes, Massive Attack’s Daddy G performing a DJ set, Craig Charles, plus hip hop royalty Big Daddy Kane, Goldie live with his orchestra, Sister Nancy, Chali 2Una from Jurassic5, Children of Zeus, Gilles Peterson, Stanton Warriors, Plump DJs, Jaguar Skills, Krafty Kuts, Freestylers, DJ Paulette, Graeme Park and many more.
What are the stage times?
Moovin Festival stage times for Friday, Saturday and Sunday
The Moovin Festival party will, as usual, run right through into the early hours, with the entertainment starting from mid-morning.
Headline performances from Sister Nancy Meets Legal Shot, Goldie, and Big Daddy Kane will all close out the main Barn Stage each night, with silent discos running until 2am at The Udder One.
And beyond the music, the programme includes fire shows, gong baths, yoga and more.
Gate opening times
Motor Home Ticket Holders Only: Friday 25 August – 11am – 9pm
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Camping Ticket Holders Only: Friday 25 August – 1pm -9pm
All Other Ticket Holders: Friday 25 August – 2pm – 9pm Saturday 26 August – 10am – 9pm Sunday 27 August – 10am – 9pm
What the headliners say
“At the bottom of a tree lined valley, a hay barn with a fat sound-system. A freewheeling crowd, no VIP red ropes, no hassle from the authorities, just music and good vibes” 90s free party? No its the brilliant Moovin Festival,” – GROOVE ARMADA
“Moovin Festival was my Highlight of the Summer. The Great Vibes, Music, Venue, the perfect organisation and all these Beautiful people made this Festival become my Favourite Worldwide” – LEE SCRATCH PERRY
“Moovin Festival is one of the standout festivals of the year for me. Wonderful location with the best party people who are always mad for it …What more could you ask for? KRAFTY KUTS
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“Whenever I get to play Moovin Festival it’s a highlight of my festival calendar. As soon as I see the waterfall I feel like I’m home. The crowd is just beautiful and the energy is electric.” DJ PAULETTE
Oasis promoters drop biggest Knebworth hint yet after securing license around key date
Danny Jones
Not that we’re the type to get carried away, but we’ll confess that our curiosity, interest and general levels of anticipation have been piqued, as Oasis’ main promoters have recently renewed the license to host events at the infamous Knebworth.
My word, is this it? Like the reunion, is it ACTUALLY going to happen?…
We’re sure the raw, uncontrollable excitement will come should it be fully confirmed, but for now, all we know is that our colleagues in music media, SJM Concerts, have renewed the land in and around Knebworth Park and House for live entertainment once again.
Moreover, the company have also done so on a rather fitting date decades on from the original and legendary outdoor gigs.
As can be found on the planning application section of the North Hertfordshire Council website – the county in which the storied Britpop gigs took place – a fresh license to hold new events.
If/when the announcement happens, the already granted permission will allow for a capacity of up to 125,000 and a curfew of 3am.
We know the original Knebworth shows were beyond iconic, but let’s say this would be nailed on to be nothing short of absolutely box office.
Besides having also helped promote Oasis’ colossal Live ’25 reunion tour last summer, it’s also worth noting that they secured said license just over a week before the 30th anniversary of the pair of nights back in 1996: 10-11 August, to be specific.
The licence is said to have come into effect this past Saturday (1 Aug) and is believed to be indefinite.
What added even more fuel to the fire of these well-established rumours over the past year was when Baroness Sharon Taylor of Stevenage told the House of Lords the band would be playing FIVE whole nights at Knebworth in the future, before later clarifying that she was speaking in “hypothetical terms.”
All that being said, it’s fair to say we’ll be keeping a very keen eye on socials over the next few days, in particular, just in case.
The Manc has reached out to SJM for an official comment (surprise, surprise), but we are yet to receive a response regarding the matter.
Your silence speaks volumes, just saying.
This coming Monday, 10 August 2026, will mark the official 30th anniversary of Oasis at Knebworth 1996, and with the likes of ‘Wonderwall’ seeing a chart resurgence as the go-to England anthem at this year’s World Cup, we’re choosing to be optimistic. What about you?
Blossoms deliver most rock and roll performance in years as Declan McKenna joins them on stage
Danny Jones
Last night, we were fortunate enough to be there in the flesh not only to see Blossoms play a special anniversary show in Manchester, but to witness Declan McKenna join them on stage.
A tiny part of us was wondering if we’d see Rick Astley roll out into the venue, but let’s just say we’ll absolutely take this.
Celebrating a decade to the day since the release of the self-titled debut LP – yes, we feel old, too – Blossoms announced the one-off intimate show at The Deaf Institute, a venue they hadn’t played in 12 whole years (good lord…), and it served as much more than a night of nostalgia.
But we’ll admit, the highlight was almost certainly seeing the ‘Brazil’ and ‘British Bombs’ singer join Tom Ogden, Charlie Salt, Josh Dewhurst, Myles Kellock and Joe Donovan on stage for their smallest gig since god knows when.
We’ve gotten somewhat used to seeing the Enfield-born solo artist popping up at random venues across the country and even performing DJ sets at local pubs.
If you haven’t seen that Kylie Minogue clip before, you really need to…
However, we don’t think anyone in the crowd was expecting this cameo, let alone hearing them perform a co-written track off the new record live in front of the audience for the very first time.
As if all of this wasn’t already a bit bonkers and left-field, the song in question, entitled ‘Additional Driver’, was self-admittedly so surprising in SO many ways that Tom felt he needed to explain the full story behind it and why Declan shouted “shoulda got the 192” before they started playing.
Yes, in some kind of Greater Mancunian fever dream, we’ve finally got artists writing lyrics about the region’s most infamous bus route that we’re sure most, if not all of you, can relate to.
But it wasn’t just this moment that had us debating in our heads, ‘are they the best Manc or maybe in Northern band full stop going right now?’, it was seeing them slip so seamlessly back into the more straight-down-the-line indie rock from their first chapter of studio material that did it.
Everyone knows and loves the biggest bangers from that inaugural outing: ‘Getaway’, ‘Charlemagne’, ‘At Most a Kiss’, ‘Honey Sweet’, etc.; but it’s hard to forget just how quintessentially rock and roll tunes like ‘Blow Rose’, ‘Cut Me and I’ll Bleed’, ‘Texia’ and even some of the other deep cuts/early releases are.
Don’t get us wrong, we love how much the dressing up (musically and quite literally) they’ve done over the years as their production, creativity and experimentation has increased, but it’s always hard to beat that feeling you get when finding an artist’s first album – especially one as good as Blossoms‘.
In fairness, listening back to ‘Deep Grass’ all these years later, we’ll still remember how spacey, psychedelic and downright different that intro felt back in the day; it now feels like a fitting end to that maiden outing and the perfect jumping-off point for what has been a real sonic exploration ever since.
For a lad born in SK2 and lucky enough to have seen these lads right from the start, stuff like this will never not feel surreal to me.
Long live ‘Blossoms from Stockport‘, and roll on Songs From The Wedding Cake this October.
Daisy Jackson -
23rd August 2023 
