Farewell Split Festival!

Today, it was announced that Split Festival would no longer take placed in Sunderland. The festival which has ran since 2009, released a statement informing us that there simply was not enough money to hold the event anymore.

In my opinion this is a huge loss to Sunderland in so many ways. Not only was it a great event that gave local bands and musicians a platform to share their music, but it also brought many music fans to Sunderland and made me, proud to be from the North East.




It opened my eyes to the amazing music that has been made up here in Sunderland and Newcastle (and everywhere in between and around), as well as this, it kind of inspired me. It proved that it doesn't matter if you're not from London or Manchester or a big "popular" city, you can still be a musician and have your music heard. It showed me and others, that although Sunderland may be small, it is mighty.

I'll admit, I only attended Split last year, so maybe that doesn't give me the right to preach about how we all should have paid more attention to it, but over the years I know for a fact it impacted the lives of so many here in the NE. I went to Split Festival 2014 as just a Maximo Park fan, and left a fan of pretty much every band I saw on main stage that day (Lilliput and Frankie & The Heartstrings being major favourites of mine). It opened my eyes to Sunderland in general too, I mean I'd been going to school in Sunderland for 5 years and didn't even know Pop Recs. existed before I bought my ticket there (oops!).

The end of Split Festival is really quite sad but we should learn from it - we need to appreciate the things we have on our doorstep more, before its too late. So appreciate local business (like Pop Recs. and Holmeside Coffee - who serve amazing coffee by the way...) and appreciate local music and most of all appreciate where your from; because I sure do!