There’s not long to go until Parklife festival returns to Heaton Park, drawing tens of thousands of music fans to the fields.
This year’s event will be headlined by global talent including 50 Cent, Tyler the Creator, Megan Thee Stallion and Lewis Capaldi, as well as returning festival favourites Chase & Status.
Parklife has taken place at Heaton Park since 2013, when it outgrew its original home in Platt Fields Park.
The massive party is attended by some 80,000 people each day and is one of the biggest events in Manchester’s cultural calendar.
Here’s everything we know about this year’s Parklife so far.
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When is Parklife festival 2022?
Parklife festival. Credit: Parklife
Last year, Parklife had to shift to September because of the restrictions placed on the events industry.
But it’s business as usual this time around, and the festival’s back in its usual June position.
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Parklife 2022 will take place on 11 and 12 June.
There’s normally an extra gig on the main stage on the Friday night – previous years have seen the likes of New Order and Noel Gallagher perform – but nothing has been announced for 2022 yet.
In Da Club rapper 50 Cent will be performing in a UK festival exclusive, and Tyler, The Creator will make his long-awaited UK headline debut after Parklife’s 2020 edition was cancelled.
Music heavyweights Lewis Capaldi, Bicep (headlining The Valley for the first time) and Chase & Status (with their largest festival show yet) will all be taking to the stage.
Parklife’s line-up also includes Loyle Carner, Jamie xx, Arlo Parks, Folamour (Live), Headie One, Central Cee, Fred Again.. ArrDee, Caroline Polachek, Tom Misch and PinkPantheress.
DJ sets across the weekend will come from Four Tet, Eric Prydz, Peggy Gou, Carl Cox, Marco Carola, Camelphat, The Blessed Madonna, Andy C, DJ EZ, Sonny Fodera Annie Mac, Jayda G, Mall Grab, Ricardo Villalobos and many more.
You can see the full line-up and stage break downs here.
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Can you still get tickets for Parklife?
Parklife festival. Credit: Parklife
Tickets for Saturday – which is headlined by 50 Cent, Chase & Status and Jamie XX – have sold out.
But you can still grab tickets for the Sunday portion of the festival, with the last few on sale now.
Day tickets are priced at £84.50 plus booking fee for standard admission, or £109.50 for VIP.
You can also pick up the last few tickets for the whole weekend at £155 general admission or £199.50 for VIP.
This year’s VIP zone will be called the Luxury Lounge, with all sorts of luxuries to jazz up your festival experience.
As usual, you’ll get fast track through the queues, and access to an exclusive VIP area with luxury loos, a separate street food village, and The Smugglers Inn bar.
Very Important Parklife-goers also have their own DJs and special guests on a dance floor that’s separate from the rest of the festival site.
New this year is the ‘northern lights’, a light tunnel installation, plus VIP lockers and free phone charging points.
Parklife is even adding a ‘Cloud 9 VIP spa’.
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Where is Parklife and how do I get there?
Parklife festival will be back in 2022. Credit: Parklife
Parklife will be back in Heaton Park, to the north of Manchester, taking over a corner of the 600-acre park.
There’s a Metrolink stop right outside the park’s gates at Heaton Park, though most fesitval-goers will be directed home via Bowker Vale instead.
The festival also puts on shuttle buses to help people get back home safely.
This year, there’s a combined Travel Pass which you can use on either the Metrolink or the shuttle buses.
You can also try to book a taxi, but with 80,000 people pouring out of the festival site, things can get busy – and a lot of people end up walking back to town if it’s safe to do so.
Featured image: Parklife
Audio
Akon speaks on his connection to Manchester after run of Co-op Live gigs
Danny Jones
Music veteran Akon has recently discussed his connection to our city following his run of live shows here in Manchester.
In fact, he went so far as to say he feels much more affinity here than he does with ‘The Big Smoke’.
The seasoned Senegalese-American rapper, singer-songwriter, entrepreneur and humanitarian, teamed up with fellow chart-topper Ne-Yo for not just one, not even two, but three whole nights at Co-op Live this May as part of their co-headline tour across the UK and Ireland.
Chatting with Simone Riley on BBC Radio Manchester before the third and final gig of the trio, Akon admitted that there’s “something about Manchester” that he loves way more than London.
As you can see, while he couldn’t quite put his finger on what exactly is about it in the North compared to the capital, he said simply that “it’s crazy here”, and he loves it.
Same, mate. Same.
Admitting that he feels “more attached to Manchester than London” and labelling the energy from the crowds as “stupid” up here (he meant it in a good way, we promise), Simone couldn’t help but confess her joy over his comments.
He’s not the only global superstar to have recently shouted out their affection for 0161, either, as Billie Eilish also said something similar.
Speaking to the mainline BBC at the premiere of her Hit Me Hard and Soft: The Tour (Live in 3D), she said that while the dates lining up were certainly a key factor, there were other reasons why she chose Manchester to film her new movie.
Our Audio North team were also lucky enough to chat with Akon’s touring partner Ne-Yo recently, too, who also had nothing but good things to say about us as a place to play.
As for Akon, the 53-year-old has obviously played here plenty of times over the decades, with last year’s tour being his first return in a decade.
That being said, given how glowingly he’s spoken about us and how popular these joint performances were, we reckon it won’t be that long before he comes back.
Last but not least, we obviously couldn’t resist going along to at least one of the nights for ourselves; listen to what we had to say about the tour in our full review down below.
Antony Szmeirek announces second album along with biggest UK tour dates yet
Danny Jones
Greater Manchester spoken word artist Antony Szmeirek has finally revealed the name, cover art and release date for his second album, along with his biggest run of UK tour dates yet.
The Tameside teacher turned full-time artist dropped his maiden record, Service Station at the End of the Universe, back in February 2025, and now, just over a year on from its launch, he’s getting ready to deliver his highly anticipated follow-up.
Entitled Decoding Birdsong, the sophomore studio project is scheduled for this summer, with a series of live shows booked for the following autumn.
Having already dropped lead single ‘The Heron’ earlier this year, Szmeirek has just released the opener from his upcoming LP, which is simply called ‘Chalk’; he’s also unveiled the rest of the tracklist and a rather striking bit of album artwork.
The Hyde-born artist is making big moves not only within the spoken word space but across multiple genres, with his music blending everything from indie, hip-hop, electronica and more.
His latest song, for instance, is more of an acid-house-esque meets contemporary EDM outing, and has quickly gone down as a popular addition among fans.
On the album name itself, he’s never one to shy away from a weird title or two – case in point, ‘The Great Pyramid of Stockport’ from his debut and ‘Dave’s Angling Superstore’ on this new record.
The 34-year-old carries that same idiosyncrasy throughout his lyricism and creative concepts, as well.
‘Chalk’ is a perfect example of this, as the song is inspired by The Edge of Everything documentary: a film about the career of legendary British snooker player, Ronnie O’Sullivan.
Here’s the music video…
As for his latest raft of live shows, these will be some of the biggest domestic gigs that the local lad has played in his career so far.
In addition to a pair of hometown shows here in Manchester, he is set to play a dozen different cities across Great Britain and Ireland.
Antony Szmierek UK/IE tour dates – October 2026
We’ve highlighted the Northern stops for you, too:
Daisy Jackson -
30th April 2022 
