Girlschool, Raven, Alcatrazz and Airforce start the Winter Metal Meltdown on 25 November in Glasgow and finish it on 6 December in Bridgewater.
Eleven dates in twelve days: Glasgow, Porthcawl, Southampton, Milton Keynes, Newcastle, then London on 1 December, Sheffield, Worthing, Hastings, Manchester and Bridgewater. Airforce join from Milton Keynes onwards and are not on the first three.
"Four decades in, celebrating what will be our 50th anniversary very soon and the fire still burns just as bright," said Jackie Chambers of Girlschool. John Gallagher of Raven put it differently: "We are bringing the maximum metal back to Blighty."
Giles Lavery of Alcatrazz says their set spans forty five years of the band. Between the four of them the bill carries most of what the new wave of British heavy metal left behind, and it is doing eleven rooms rather than four festivals, which is the part worth noticing.