Great to hear you had fun, it really is great. And imo the main line-up never does it proper justice because there is so much going on pretty much everywhere you look. If you cannot find something to do there, well then you are screwed!
Exactly, the music is only half of it. The immersiveness of the place is just beyond belief. There is simply nowhere else like it on this earth. Then to top it off, the music (especially some of the surprise acts/guests) is like no other festival.
We certainly do festivals very well. I recently watched woodstock 99, the Americans must look at all our festivals in disbelief.
Didn't watch much of Friday's sets but enjoyed most of Saturday & Sunday's where I seemed to go for the " golden oldies " to watch The Pretenders ( probably fave set ) Blondie , Barrington Levy , Candi Staton , Billy Idol ( terrible doing Generation X stuff ) & Manic Street Preachers were very good , I didn't watch any of Elton John due to 5.25am alarm but have recorded The War On Drugs & Q.O.T.S.A. can imagine both of their sets will be good . Wonder how many 1,000's of non recyclable tents have been left this year ? Green my ar*e !
Love to know nowadays how much a pint , a tray of chips & a burger cost ? Glad you enjoyed it , you can have an amazing time & not even watch any music there's that much to do & see once you get your bearings . We spent an afternoon / early evening in the comedy tent , saw Bill Bailey who was good but not a patch on Frank Sidebottom who was hilarious though that was 1995 imagine it's a lot different now .
A pint was £6.50. Most meals about £9-12 but some stalls offered good £6 deals (for example a bacon and egg sandwich + coffee). Not cheap but not extortionate in the circumstances. The big plus point is you can take your own food and drink anywhere onsite, unlike most festivals who have an inner ring where you can't take any booze in. I was in the tent for that and it was sublime. The tent retained the atmosphere so well and it was probably my highlight set of the weekend.
Loved checking the new bands, i do like some of the legendary slots but most are pretty poor, maybe time to let the younger upcoming bands take the headline slots?
It's pretty ridiculous that the 3 headliners were Elton John (in his 70s), Guns N Roses (released their seminal album in the 80s) and Arctic Monkeys (debut album nearly 20 years old). Add into this the act following the traditional legends slot, was Blondie ffs. Festivals are pushing themselves into a corner with these sorts of choices. Glastonbury in a particular weird position because they pay artists much less than the usual fees. They need to be creative then and help create stars. Even the "surprise guests" are becoming repetitive. Fair play to Elton John for bringing out two artists who are new-ish.
I always thought that was kind of the point of Glastonbury, to have headliners that are legends rather than up and coming artists. I thought Guns n Roses were okay, Blondie were okay too, neither lead singer can come close to their singing voices of their prime but age does that to people. No comment about the Arctic Monkeys because I don't like them so didn't see them. I watched the Elton John set though, I've never bought one of his albums but he's undeniably a music legend, and if that really was his final live performance in England then where better to do it?
Ultimately I lik to avoid getting obsessive about the headliners as end of the day there's so much on there you shouldn't care. But there's 100% an issue with not enough "headline" bands coming through, and the festival's recycling through acts and not giving new bands a shot will screw the system over as you will run the well dry.
Thats what its become, i think the whole legend thing bega in the late 90's. Maybe its too entrenched in modern glastonbury, and maybe it helps sell tickets?
Honestly, more than anything I think this is just a consequence of a massive change in how we consume music. Never before has a listener had such a variety of music to listen to, right at their fingertips. As late as the 90s music would have been consumed through whatever you could find at the record store or whatever a DJ decided to play on the radio. Fast forward and just over 20 years later, for however much a month Spotify is you can listen to almost every song released under a record label from about the 50s to the present day, and an mammoth amount of independently released music too. I'm not sure putting newer bands on headline slots will necessary make a difference to this. I mean, I'm not saying it wouldn't be great to see newer bands and artists given headline slots, I just don't think it's going to change the fact not many headline bands are coming through nowadays. You'll probably just see less people attending those headline sets, whether the newer bands come in to being headliners now, or when the well of headline-level bands dry up. That said, I don't think it's going to be a massive issue. Glastonbury already cover a massive range of genres and artists, but other big festivals will simply start to do the same to adapt to what the demand is. The role of the headliner will probably just adapt into being something that just isn't as big of a deal as it used to be, imo.
Cat Stevens was the Legends act this year, Debbie turned up because the place is turning into an old people’s home. I’m expecting a supergroup to headline next year called The Gratefully Undead.
I agree with Josh in that the reason for the lack of headliners is because of the way music is consumed. I'd also argue it's the type of music being released as well. There's not a great number of guitar bands anymore, and whenever I have the misfortune of listening to the radio these days it seems that every single seems to be a collaboration of some sort rather than just an artist themselves. I know I'm at risk of sounding like an old man yelling at a cloud, but everything seems to just sound so overproduced now. It's why I don't like the Arctic Monkeys' new sound. Does acoustic even exist anymore? There are simply no groundbreaking bands coming through now that capture the mindset of the youth and who you can't turn around without seeing something about them. There's no Oasis v Blur beef, there's no Arctic Monkeys crashing the charts with "I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor" after breaking the internet. These are your Love Island and Sidemen now - people famous despite having no talent whatsoever, whilst no-one cares about pop and rock stars. What Glastonbury was great at was having a headliner that had just broken through and everyone wanted to see. The aforementioned Arctic Monkeys in 2007, just after their second album, for example. This is when they were truly at their peak - the first album was astonishing, the second arguably better, they were still new enough that not everyone would have seen them and people could still be getting into them for the first time. The other headliners were The Killers (3 years after Hot Fuss) and The Who (your legend band). So that was two bands who were very much in the public eye at the time, and a legend band to close the weekend. This brings me to another point, that Josh touched on. Bands and artists simply linger around for longer now. The times as a whole don't change as much. The Arctics headlined in 2007, and then again in 2013, and once again 16 years after they first did, and not once as a nostalgia act. My 12 year old has friends at school who consider the Arctic Monkeys their favourite band - they were my favourite band 4 years before he was born!! Beyoncé released her first solo single 20 years ago - she is still releasing new music and selling out stadiums (she played a few nights at the Tottenham Hotspur stadium a couple of weeks back) - she is still a mega star with the youth 20 years on. I loved The Beatles as a kid, but they would never have been my favourite band. I listen to a podcast that reviews old Top of the Pops episodes, and the difference between single years is astonishing. Watch an episode of totp from 1984, then watch one from 1994. It's like looking at two completely different Worlds. If a band or group from the early 80s is on, then they're seen as ancient. However, if totp was still going now, it would look almost exactly the same as it did in 2003, with a lot of the same acts on as then. tl;dr - I'm getting old and struggling with it.
I agree with what you said, I remember the blur v oasis days I remember grungle before that, madchester before that,House music before that...all within 8 years....that simply could never happen now. But I'm sure if we were 17 again we'd love all the new music around. I still do though, I think I crave new music more now than i did in my yoof. I do wonder if guitar bands will ever dominate again? Its been 20 years since they did. But that said there's still lots of great guitar music out there it just might not be top of the charts, that said sam fender did just play 2 nights at st james park, 6 years ago he was on the dole, so theres still demand for it. Maybe not a guitar band per see but miles away from instagram/reality TV show karaoke crap.
Completely agree. The state of the world right now and no one has written a masterpiece about it is really sad. Have we all just become so apathetic? Is it that there's no money in it anymore? Who knows but it's grim imo
Surely they won't make it another year about Dave Grohl? Foo Fighters 2024 UK tour: 13th June-27th June Foo Fighters announce UK tour dates for 2024 Glastonbury 2024 main festival: 28th-30th June Glastonbury confirm dates for 2024 festival (they obviously will )
That's not too bad . In 95 & 97 we used the Somerset Cider Bus a big double decker & it was £2.50 for a 6% I think & £3.50 with a brandy thrown in . Re food , we always used to take our own tinned stuff , that & not eat
Mainstream bands have also released nothing but rubbish for the best part of a decade too which doesn't help.
