Are one night stays always a bad idea? Northern England Industrial cities

Yeah, it's doable. Assuming you'll only be flitting around the cities of northern England then it's short journeys (no more than a couple of hours). Of those places you listed I think Newcastle's the most interesting anyway (to be fair I am biased) and you plan to allocate an additional day for that.

All of this said, it'd be helpful to see some kind of itinerary/what you would like to do in each place in order to firm up the feasibility of your plan.

Admittedly a very long time since I visited Leeds and Sheffield but I remember them both as being ugly and dirty (apologies to any locals, especially the late, great Joe Cocker). The worst part of your trip, and the part I find hardest to fathom, is why you would want to see Phil Collins in concert. Has the brilliant Peter Gabriel retired? Are Herman's Hermits no longer in vogue? Is Freddie Garrity no longer dreaming with his Dreamers?

One night stays have their purpose. If this is what you want to do then I say do it! I try to avoid one night stays, but we enjoying bike tours which consist of all one night stays. Same with walking tours. So they are not impossible, just try minimize them.

I just wanted to mention that the Hampton by Hilton in Newcastle is a great place to stay. Directly across from the train station and the tram from the airport stops just outside. The rooms were clean, quiet, and the breakfast good. Price was quite reasonable.

For one night stays, I'm okay with it as long as you've got a rental sedan and it's generally a safe area to keep luggage in the trunk while you've left the car parked for a few hours. IMO, not a huge difference between putting a day bag into the car in the morning before heading out and shoving the whole vacation kit into the trunk for the trip to the next hotel. (Can't remember a time when hotel check-out these days took more than give minutes or so)

Trains and not having an easy place to stash luggage at all times might tip it the other way for me.

And go for the Phil concert! We missed him in London earlier this year when he had his slip and fall and cancelled shows

Actually, Rick's phrasing is "minimize one-night stands." That, I agree with; eliminating them, no.

I also agree with you that for some cities, one night is perfect, and more time is a liability. For instance, in France, Carcassonne was a perfect one-nighter. In Hungary, Eger and Pecs worked well as one-nighters from Budapest, and in the Czech Republic, Cesky Krumlov and Olomouc were equally good one-nighters from Prague. In all of these cases, there was enough travel time to make them too far for a day trip, but not enough to do to justify more than one overnight.

Some of the concerts have sold out and others are limited supply, so if you want to see a concert, book asap as they are likely to sell out before long. You shouldn't buy tickets from touts.

Train tickets are best value purchased 11 weeks out.