Bearded Theory has triumphed to win Line Up of The Year for its 2024 outing headlined by Jane’s Addiction, Amyl and the Sniffers, Future Islands, Sleaford Mods, Orbital and Dinosaur Jr at the UK Festival Awards.
The five-day camping festival on a private estate in the heart of the National Forest beat off some strong competition from Victorious, Wide Awake, Deer Shed, Liverpool Sound City and Beat Herder to scoop the title at the awards ceremony held in Bristol on 3 December.
The 2024 edition of the 15,000 capacity Catton Park festival featured Jane’s Addiction, one of the most influential alternative rock bands of the 90s, in a UK festival exclusive – the band’s first full set in their original line-up of Perry Farrell, Dave Navarro, Stephen Perkins and Eric Avery since 2010.
There was also a first festival headline slot for Aussie punks Amyl and the Sniffers, with synth pop from Future Islands and punk rock from Soft Play completing the main stage headline billing for the weekend. The diverse line-up also brought plenty of newer artists to the festival, from Mercury-winning English Teacher, Bob Vylan and Dry Cleaning to Panic Shack, Sprints and Prima Queen.
It was just the second time the line-up had been programmed by DHP Family who stepped in two years ago to take over the running of the established festival. The growing bill for its 16th edition in 2025 is already proving popular, with the festival currently adding a new act every day in celebration of advent.
Anton Lockwood, DHP Family Director of Live said: “It’s crucial for us that we respect the festival’s heritage, whilst evolving the line up to take us into the future, we’re really proud of how we’ve been able to achieve that – and we’re delighted to receive this award and the recognition from our peers. We can’t wait to build on that with the next tranche of announcements for 2025!”
The festival has plenty of scope for delivering a diverse line-up to suit a wide range of tastes with eight stages from The Pallet, home to some iconic headline performances, to newer additions introduced by DHP including The Meadow, a second stage in a big top, and Coda, a haven for electronic dance music lovers.
Bearded Theory festival programmer Ben Ryles said: “It’s a massive privilege booking Bearded Theory where I get to invite some of my favourite artists to perform to a captive audience. The event in 2024 was a real personal highlight for me and it’s nice that the programming has been recognised on a national level. There were so many fantastic performances across the weekend including Jane’s Addiction, English Teacher, Future Islands, Sprints, Prima Queen and THAT headline performance from Amyl and the Sniffers of course. We’re continuing to book a diverse, eclectic bill for 2025 and look forward to welcoming everyone next May.”
Bearded Theory is also up for Festival of The Year at the industry’s LIVE awards being held in London on 11 December.
Tickets for the 21-25 May 2025 camping festival are selling strongly for the already announced line up of Iggy Pop, Manic Street Preachers, Sisters of Mercy, Yard Act, Leftfield, The Mary Wallopers, Nova Twins and Ash plus two BBC 6 Music Artists of the Year 2024; CMAT and Fat Dog.
