Beacons Metro is a

music festival A music festival is a community event with performances of singing and instrument playing that is often presented with a theme such as musical genre (e.g., rock, blues, folk, jazz, classical music), nationality, locality of musicians, or h ...

that took place at various venues in Leeds, Liverpool and Manchester in October 2015–2017. The festival was formerly named simply Beacons and took place on the middle weekend of August 2011–2014 at Heslaker Farm on the Funkirk Estate,

Skipton Skipton (also known as Skipton-in-Craven) is a market town and civil parish in the Craven district of North Yorkshire, England. Historically in the East Division of Staincliffe Wapentake in the West Riding of Yorkshire, it is on the River Air ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

History

Beacons, which replaced the

Moor Music Festival The Moor Music Festival was an annual music festival held initially on a farm in Addingham Moorside, near the town of Ilkley, West Yorkshire. For the 2009 and 2010 festivals, the setting was moved to Heslaker Farm near to Skipton in North Yorkshi ...

, was set to begin at Heslaker Farm on the Funkirk Estate,

in 2011, with Tom Vek,

Jamie Woon Jamie Woon (born 29 March 1983) is a British singer, songwriter, and record producer signed to PMR Records. He gained widespread acclaim in 2010 for his single "Night Air", which was co-produced by Burial, following his previous independent rel ...

and

Jamie xx James Thomas Smith (born 28 October 1988), known professionally as Jamie xx, is an English musician, DJ, record producer and remixer. He is known for both his solo work and as a member of the English indie pop band The xx. He has been described ...

as headliners. The festival was cancelled at the last minute however, due to adverse weather. In 2012 the festival returned and took place for the first time with headline performances from Roots Manuva,

Factory Floor Factory Floor are a London-based band formed in 2005. They have been described as 'post-industrial', using live drums, synthesizers and noise. History The band formed in 2005, originally comprising Gabriel Gurnsey and Mark Harris, who were then ...

Cass McCombs Cass McCombs (born November 13, 1977 in California) is an American musician and songwriter. Since 2002 he has released ten albums, an EP and a B-sides compilation under his own name. McCombs’ music blends elements of many styles including Ameri ...

, Willy Mason and King Krule. The 2013 festival took place across 16–18 August and featured performances from Django Django, Savages,

Local Natives Local Natives is an American indie rock band based in Silver Lake, Los Angeles. The band consists of Taylor Rice (vocals, guitar), Kelcey Ayer (vocals, keyboards, guitar), Ryan Hahn (guitar, backing vocals), Matt Frazier (drums) and Nik Ewing (ba ...

and Fucked Up. The 2014 festival, headlined by

Daughter A daughter is a female offspring; a girl or a woman in relation to her parents. Daughterhood is the state of being someone's daughter. The male counterpart is a son. Analogously the name is used in several areas to show relations between groups ...

, The Fall and Action Bronson, was the last to take place at Heslaker. In February 2015 the organisers announced that, despite Beacons 2014 being the "best ... so far", feedback they had received suggested that "the cost of attending a traditional, camping festival was becoming increasingly difficult to meet" for many festival goers and, as a result, they had made the decision to change the format to an inner-city festival, with events in Leeds, Manchester and Liverpool in October of that year. This tri-city event, "the next stage of the festival's evolution", was renamed Beacons Metro. The Leeds leg of Beacons Metro, part of a 12-week programme of events, opened with a performance from

Pissed Jeans Pissed Jeans is an American hardcore punk band from Allentown, Pennsylvania. The band claims to play "loud, heavy, noisy, punk rock" and is influenced by 1980s hardcore punk and post-hardcore bands. The band has released several seven singles ...

at Belgrave Music Hall before moving to the three-storey Headrow House, formally home to the "notorious" Big Lil's nightclub which was closed in 2004 after a number of violent incidents, while the Manchester leg featured a performance from

Mac DeMarco MacBriare Samuel Lanyon DeMarco (born Vernor Winfield MacBriare Smith IV; April 30, 1990) is a Canadian singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer. DeMarco has released six full-length studio albums, his debut ''Rock and Roll Night C ...

at the city's Albert Hall.

References

{{reflist, 2 Music festivals in North Yorkshire Rock festivals in England Skipton