We had no intention of going this year since it was our 20th (!!!) wedding anniversary so we were going to go back to Siena at the start of June. But the elder daughter and her boyfriend wanted to go so we said we’d help out trying to get tickets for them and so when we actually managed to get through we of course ended up putting all five of us in.
As ever there was far too much I wanted to see. I’ll stick up a Spotify playlist of what I wanted to see, but here’s what I ended up seeing. I decided I would prioritise getting to stages I’d not been to before over artists I wanted to see. This was a fantastic idea and also somewhat helped with making decisions over clashes. And as luck would have it, it meant I had checked off most of the stages (Greenpeace, Glade, Strummerville, Croissant Neuf, Acoustic, Left Field) by the end of Friday. Artist-wise my must sees were Heartworms and then something Scottish (ended up being Corto.Alto) as I felt bad in 2023 for missing all the Scottish acts.
- Wednesday
- Small world stage: Headmix
- Thursday
- 13:45 Greenpeace: Anna Erhard
- 15:00 Greenpeace: Joshua Idehen
- 17:15 Glade: MJ Cole
- 20:00 Strummerville: Jeanie and the whiteboys
- 21:00 Strummerville: Heartworms *
- 00:00 Bimble Inn: Dogshow ^
- Friday:
- 11:30 Holts: Corto.Alto
- 13:15 Croissant Neuf: Nancy Williams *
- 14:00 Park: Jalen Ngonda
- 15:15 Woodsies: Shed 7 ^
- 15:45 Other: Wet leg ^
- 17:00 Acoustic: Billie Martin *
- 17:45 Greenpeace: Jarvis DJing ^
- 18:45 Greenpeace: Miso Extra ^
- 19:00 Luna: Joy Anonymous x Kurupt ^
- 19:50 Left Field: Antony Szmierek *
- 22:30 Other: Loyle Carner ^
- Saturday:
- 11:30 Other: Alessi Rose
- 12:45 Other: Good Neighbours
- 14:00 Park: Japanese breakfast
- 14:30 Holts: Bob Vylan ^
- 16:00 Holts: Kneecap
- 18:45 Pyramid: Pulp (Patchwork)
- 20:30 Lonely: A.G. Cook
- 22:30 Other: Charli xcx
- 00:00 Bimble: Alex James DJing (OAP disco)
- 01:00 Arcadia: Annie Mac B2B Jamz Supernova ^
- 02:00 Arcadia: Groove Armada B2B Jungle ^
- Sunday:
- 14:00 Woodsies: Sprints
- 15:30 Woodsies: Djo
- 18:20 Avalon: Big Moon *
- 19:45 Other: Wolf Alice
- 21:45 Other: Prodigy
- 23:20 Tree Stage: Max Cooper ^
- 00:20 Tree Stage: Jon Hopkins ^
- 00:30 San Remo: Job Jobse ^
- 23:30 Levels: Seth Troxler ^
- 01:00 Levels: Groove Armada ^
- 00:10 Arcadia: ShyFX B2B Eats Everything ^
- 01:30 Arcadia: Basslayerz B2B Born on Road ^
* - Original must sees, based on stages
^ - Didn’t see the whole set. Sunday night we had a whirlwind tour on the way back to the tent
My top three (not necessarily in any particular order) based on emotions (almost crying; definitely welled up):
- Antony Szmierek
- Sprints
- Pulp
Other notable mentions: Joshua Idehen (amazing) and Heartworms (obviously, although we annoyingly ended up next to people who decided to meetup and talk all the way through it, which put a bit of a dampener on it).
I really noticed crowd “issues” this time round. Already mentioned Heartworms, but for Shed 7 I missed most of it because I went to the bar and then couldn’t get back into the tent due to “crowd crust” on the edges. People sat in friggin’ chairs! If I hadn’t have had a drink in each hand and a backpack on I would have just pushed through as A had gone in and there was plenty of room. On a related note, the crowd can really make or break an act: With Wolf Alice, the crowd where we were felt really flat; I thought it was just people getting an early spot for Prodigy, but when Wolf Alice finished everyone left. Weird; I don’t get the point in going and not enjoying yourself? I didn’t mind too much as we’ll never beat when we saw Wolf Alice at Barrowlands.
I, of course, missed a load of stuff I wanted to see. I do have regrets (Marie Davidson, Biig Piig, Two Shell, Lens, John Glacier, Doeechi, Divorce, Lambrini Girls, etc…). Such is Glastonbury. My “prioritise stages” plan was causing issues with the family by the end of Friday (I am perfectly happy to go off on my own and see stuff, others… less so) so Saturday and Sunday I mostly went along with what others wanted to do, but this worked out ok - you have to be a bit flexible at Glastonbury - as I would have skipped Pulp for something else and yet that ended up in my top three. As per last time, though, I think the best way to experience Glastonbury is as a single person who thinks the line-up is crap.