Outfield Festival has been one of the biggest events to happen in Midsomer Norton in recent years.

The music event started in 2019 and has gone from strength to strength, even post-pandemic.

Festival organiser Matt Dando explained the origins of the idea:

“It started from being involved with the Midsomer Norton Cricket Club and them needing upgrades to facilities, needing to bring money in to be able to improve what they could offer to local kids and sport in general.”

“Going back fifteen, twenty years, they used to do a music day. So I suggested to some of the members that we took a look at reinventing that.”

Matt said it was very difficult to get it going, but organisers managed to make it happen. Back in 2019, Toploader headlined the event which helped get bands booked for 2020, including Scouting For Girls, then the Coronavirus pandemic hit.

“Luckily we managed to keep hold of Scouting For Girls for last year’s festival.”

Last year was a sell-out, with tickets running out two to three weeks before the festival.

Ticket sales doubled those of 2019. The gig was at full-capacity, selling 2,000 tickets in total. The organisers have upped the capacity to 2,500 for this year's event.

Gate times will be released at a later date, but punters can expect music to be going on throughout the daytime, right up until 11:30PM. The festival will be held on Sunday, 27th August this year.

There will be a total of five to six bands playing on the day, with DJ slots going on too. There’s a kids area with youngster-friendly entertainment such as arts and crafts, children’s entertainers and crockery smash. There will also be a silent disco - this proved a hit last year. It was aimed at the under 18’s, but adults loved it!

Local food stalls will be involved, too.

So, who will be playing?

“I’m already seeing the bands that we’ve booked this year pop up on other festival bills, so I think we’ve made a good choice again” Matt teases.

“Our headliners this year are going to be The Hoosiers”

The Hoosiers gained traction in 2007 with their debut album, “The Trick to Life”, reaching number one in the UK album chart. They have multiple well known tracks from that debut album, including “Goodbye Mr. A”, which peaked at number 4 in the UK singles chart.

"Our sub headliner this year is Dodgy, they’re a nineties band. Anyone under the age of thirty may not be familiar with them, but certainly anyone thirty five and above will know who they are".

Dodgy are an English rock band with past big hits such as "Staying Out for the Summer" and "Good Enough".

“What’s important to us with our lineup is to try and cater to all tastes and age ranges".

On a final note, Matt adds, “We’d like to take this opportunity to shout out and thank our sponsors as well. Without them this would not be possible, they’ve covered half of the costs. Truespeed, Quickprint Midsomer Norton and St Austell Brewery have all been kind enough to be the main sponsors behind this year’s event.”

"Sam Chivers’ Estate Agents have also supported us from the very start in 2019, and they still continue to do so. Sam’s always looking at ways he can help us as well which is really important to us. We’ve got Midsomer Norton’s Simple Recruitment who are on board again from last year as well, all of which is brilliant help”.

"Somer Valley FM, and Richard Burgess the station manager in particular, has been a massive help to us last year. Richard has partnered with us to help push what we are doing, and we’re doing the same for him, trying to push the local radio station as much as we can.”

Tickets go on sale at 6pm today (Friday, 13th January) and will be available from the tickets page on their website.

Pick up the next issue of The Journal to read the full interview with festival organiser Matt Dando.