Are there northern dialects which still preserve velars before front vowels? It's well known that Modern Standard Mandarin has merged what were historically velar stops and alveolar silibants when followed by front vowels. For instance, 京 is "jing" rather than "ging", and 津 is "jin" rather than "zin".

While there are plenty of southern dialects which preserve this distinction, I was under the impression that 北方话 dialects (regardless of whether they are in the north) had this merger.

However in a YouTube video (from the 老饭骨 channel), I heard what seems to be 激 pronounced by one of them as "gi" (the other uses standard "ji"). Is this distinction still a thing in at least some northern dialects? Or perhaps a merger where the velars won?
I'm not sure 北方话 here means mandarin (官话) languages or the Chinese languages in northern China. 

If the former, most 桂柳官话, i.e. southwestern mandarins in Guangxi, meet your requirements.

If the latter, some dialects in Shandong preserve the pronunciation somehow between palatal and velar.

A CCP political figure 孙政才, who is from 山东荣成, speaks with an accent with this feature. BTW, he was beaten by Xi, sentenced to life imprisonment.

孙政才讲话