HAVING played a fair few festivals in their time, the Levellers decided to stage their own.

And just days after the 12th Levellers family music festival, Beautiful Days, has taken place in Devon, the band will head up North to discover a new one — Ramsbottom Festival.

The folk-rockers will make their Rammy debut when they headline the Friday night of the three-day festival, from September 19 to 21.

Speaking of Beautiful Days, which takes place from August 15 to 17, frontman Mark Chadwick said: “Because we had played so many festivals over the years, we thought we would do it properly.

“A non-commercial thing just really for the people.

“A real good mix of live acts, comedy.

“We don’t care how popular they are. They can be massive or small. Just good live bands.

“A good festival is people getting a mix of cultures, meeting new people, having a good time without feeling like they are being ripped off or mile-long queues for the bar and the toilet.”

Other headliners joining the Levellers at Ramsbottom Cricket Club will be British Sea Power and Soul II Soul, as well as acts including The Tapestry, Gramotones, Jimi Goodwin, Cara Dillon and Keston Cobblers Club.

Following festival season, Mark and his bandmates are looking forward to the release of their Greatest Hits album on September 29, as well as a November tour.

The album includes every Levellers' single and video released over the past 25 year, as well as four new recordings with contemporary artists, re-working some of their classic material.

Imelda May appears on Beautiful Day, Bellowhead take on Just The One, Billy Bragg performs Hope Street and Frank Turner breathes new life into Julie, one of his favourite songs while growing up.

Mark said: “We have done some collaborations which have been really good fun. We had people like Imelda May, Frank Turner, down for the day.”

Last month saw the premiere of a film about the Levellers’ rise to fame, A Curious Life, told from the perspective of Jeremy Cunningham, the band’s bass player and artist, and directed by former Chumbawamba frontman Dunstan Bruce.

It focuses on the band’s phenomenal success between 1988 and 1998 before they disappeared for a time in a train wreck of drink, drugs and creative drought.

However, despite reaching their lowest ebb, the band never split up and, after a few years in the wilderness, they re-invented themselves as a self-managing collective with their own studio and label.

Mark said: “It’s a bit different to your normal rockumentary. We don’t always come out of it looking good but it’s a better way of doing it.

“I don’t think we have really had a break, to be honest.

“We have never really split.

“We are busy, it’s great to be busy.”

Founded in 1988 in Brighton, where they still have a studio, the band went on to sell more platinum, gold and silver albums in the 90s than any other act.

From the folk punk roots of Carry Me to the anthemic One Way, Fifteen Years, Hope Street, Just The One and Beautiful Day to more recent tracks such as Truth Is and Cholera Well, all show that the Levellers' mix of scathing political comment and positive DIY attitude to life has not dissipated with age.

Mark said: “I always wanted to be in a band.

“I remember seeing bands and thinking, that looks fun.

“It came together very easily. We got on very well and we still do.

“No-one has died.

“There’s been the odd fallout but nothing major.

“We share the same principles. We all get paid the same, there’s no inequality.”

Ramsbottom Festival is at Ramsbottom Cricket Club from Friday, September 19, to Sunday, September 21.

Visit ramsbottomfestival.com for more details and tickets.