EBBW Vale’s home-grown Steelhouse Festival returned for its sixth year this weekend with record-breaking numbers of people.

The two-day festival, which every year brings rock music from around the world to a mountain-top farm in Aberbeeg, this year saw 11,000 people attend – up from 8,000 last year.

Matt Reed, 46, who launched the festival with lifelong friend and fellow musician Mikey Evans, said an extra campsite had to be opened because of the boom in visitors.

“It’s absolutely amazing, it’s been the most incredible show,” Mr Reed, from Cwm, said.

“Yesterday was record breaking, the weather was fantastic and the numbers were thrilling.

“It’s well over our predictions and we have had to open an extra campsite for it. The weather and the reputation the festival is building is a perfect storm for it.”

He said the landowner in charge of Hafod-y-Dafal farm, where the festival is based, is “fantastic” and the festival can be expanded.

“As one of the boys said, next year we are going to have to build a bigger boat,” Mr Reed said.

“Next year we’ll need to open more campsites.”

The festival was headlined by Thunder on Saturday and the Darkness on Sunday. Other acts included Terrorvision, the Answe, Blues Pills and Hey! Hello!

Mr Reed and Mr Evans met at Ebbw Vale Comprehensive as teenagers.

He said: “We are both former musicians and there’s an appetite for this kind of event in Wales.

“We thought we would have a stab at it. The operation is getting much slicker and it is working very well.”

He added: “This is our dream to do this and it’s really come to fruition. There were tears yesterday.”