Silverburn Festival 2018

Silverburn festival is a reasonably new festival having only been around since 2015 but the organisers were making some good noise about it, and sharing the bones of a great line up of acts, many of them local to the festival and some from further afield, so we thought best to go check it out.

We arranged to arrive early, on the Friday evening, with the festival not kicking off till Saturday, to give a chance to wander the site and get a feel for the place and a cool place it is too. The festival is held annually across two days in Silverburn Park, a large green area near Leven in Fife, it’s a great looking place with potential for expansion of the festival in the future as it currently only takes up one wee corner of the large site, but don’t be fooled, that wee corner was a fair size.

On arrival at the park we met with two guys, the only guys on site at that, Mark and Bez, they were the organisers and informed me that an army of volunteers would be arriving in the morning and that the two of them had everything else ready to roll, which they had, large marquee housing the main stage was up, toilets, barriers etc all done and just two guys, that’s a decent start, these guys meant business. But what about the festival?

The Saturday started well after a lightning scare almost saw an end to the day, and with the line up being endowed with local talent Silverburn Park quickly started to fill with their fans, kicking the day off with some great acts including Gentleman Jackals, Blind Summit and local favourites Break The Butterfly soon filled the marquee with a great crowd. I love a Fife crowd, some of the friendliest people around for sure, Silverburn Festival attracted all the best ones too, great people all weekend. Outside the marquee the festival was arranged in 2 areas, the Main Stage Area and the Walled Garden area which from what I saw was not the best populated part of the festival, it seemed quiet which is a shame because the festivals second stage, The Wee Acoustic Stage, was down there. The Main Stage area by comparison was bustling, good food to be had, a bar, some stalls and the main marquee.

The quality of music continued though with a belter of a set from Oskar Braves, swiftly followed by Burn The Maps all sounding epic on the Silverburn stage thanks to The Guys from Local company LT Audio. It didn’t finish there either as the ace up the sleeve was a headline slot from the always entertaining Root System who as always had the fife crowd jumping, a fitting end to a brilliant day. Sunday was no different, busy all day and superb sets from the likes of Amy Lou, Messed Up Youth, Von Zillas, Groucho Underdog, The Decrees, Buzzards Of Babylon, 13 Tombs, Crime Desk, Smoke Stacks, Moonlight Zoo and Sauza Kings the music was bang on.

Silverburn had me, this festival was brilliantly different in the sense that it supported local musicians in a big way and complimented that with just a few well chosen bands from further afield and they chose them well, act after act, all brilliant. Silverburn Park itself was a joy, a great place to be and it’s a superb partnership using this fantastic space to host a festival that is all about the local. I hope to see Silverburn Festival grow and have more stages spread across the beautiful park it is set in, that way it can continue to support the huge amount of talent that Fife has to offer and get more of them on their stages. I think it will grow as well, Mark and Bez were 2 guys with a mission and a message, Fife has great musicians so lets put them on a festival stage in Fife, at least that’s what I took from this excellent weekend. I suggest you go and see what you think but don’t hesitate as it sold out last year and if the first line up release for 2019 is anything to go by this year will be no different, the festival is on the 28th and 29th July this year, ticket info coming soon.

Follow Silverburn Festival on Facebook for all the details, links and pictures below. https://www.facebook.com/silverburnfestival/

http://www.silverburnpark.co.uk/music-festival      

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