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Glastonbury

Things changed completely when they gave in to "the Man" and put up the massive fence.
The battle between commerce and hippies was done, and the great unwashed was locked out in the end.
At that point, the middle classes took over, the cost escalated, and it all went a bit off, in my humble opinion.
 
Quantum said:
It's less about the music and more how hard you can virtue signal.
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"Asked if the event still stands for something, Sir Michael told Glastonbury Free Press, the festival’s resident newspaper: “Oh heaven’s above, yes, of course it does.
“And I think the people that come here are into all those things. People that don’t agree with the politics of the event can go somewhere else!”"
from https://www.msn.com/en-gb/politics/...nbury-s-politics-can-go-elsewhere/ar-AA1HsDXk
 
jon81uk said:
"Asked if the event still stands for something, Sir Michael told Glastonbury Free Press, the festival’s resident newspaper: “Oh heaven’s above, yes, of course it does.
“And I think the people that come here are into all those things. People that don’t agree with the politics of the event can go somewhere else!”"
from https://www.msn.com/en-gb/politics/...nbury-s-politics-can-go-elsewhere/ar-AA1HsDXk
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How very inclusive, maybe we do need a new festival that is actually about you know, music? Glastonbury has always had a political element but the music came first and for most. I think the balance has gone this year and throw in some absolutely terrible live performances it's really gone downhill
 
Quantum said:
How very inclusive, maybe we do need a new festival that is actually about you know, music? Glastonbury has always had a political element but the music came first and for most. I think the balance has gone this year and throw in some absolutely terrible live performances it's really gone downhill
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I think one of the differences is in the past the political elements were far less polarising and hostile. Nuclear disarmament, world peace, music against racism and so on compared to now leading crowds to wish death upon groups, though i think that's more symptomatic of modern society than something isolated to Glastonbury.

In fairness it's something most of the artists don't cover and typically the ones that do are those who you expect to so i don't really have an issue with it beyond the broadcast decisions.

The festival has always been arguably the most political on the UK circuit and there are plenty of others every weekend throughout the summer that are far less so. I'm sure by August the media will have moved on to the collapse of the nation when Travis Scott performs at Reading/Leeds.
 
People have been claiming that Glastonbury has been "going downhill" for decades now, often from their armchair. The festival is so many things to so many different people, most of whom are not in regular attendance. I caught up on a load of performances last night via the BBC, and aside from a truly dire turn for The Libertines, I liked the majority of what I saw, both in terms of quality and presentation; Pulp, Turnstile, Fcukers, and Franz Ferdinand teasing bringing out Lewis Capaldi, then introducing Peter.

It's said every year, but bears repeating; you don't need to be at any of the stages broadcast to enjoy Glastonbury. There are miles upon miles of smaller happenings, some more explicitly political than anything you’d encounter at the Pyramid, and plenty more specialising in absolute nonsense that thrives simply because it can.

As for politics, we were apparently literally on the verge of nuclear warfare last weekend. Meanwhile, every major human rights organisation in existence now believes that the government of the United Kingdom is currently aiding and abetting a genocide. It was always going to be a prickly edition. Nonetheless, I have a dozen or so friends who were there partying or performing, who are slowly making their way from the site and reporting it was a classic.
 
Bowser said:
I think one of the differences is in the past the political elements were far less polarising and hostile. Nuclear disarmament, world peace, music against racism and so on compared to now leading crowds to wish death upon groups, though i think that's more symptomatic of modern society than something isolated to Glastonbury.
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Politically the world is very hostile atm, and society constantly reflects that. And given what the IDF specifically are doing (given that were the targets of the chants) in Palestine openly, a rejection of their behaviour isn’t that surprising. It is NOT the same as chanting "Death to Israel/Arabs" as some circles do, as the IDF are an army force, it's akin to being anti-RAF or Marine Corp.

Unfortunately the world has decided that you must pick a side on this. And no grey area is allowed. If you want IDF to stop shooting civilians you must be antisemitic. But you can also disagree with the actions of Hamas with this. Novel concept to many these days unfortunately.

Been plenty of musicians using "Free Palestine" and genocide words at a few festivals. Including at Download, sometimes words need to be harsher for people to take notice. As it also allows the mental gymnastics of the media to take place. Saw a Spectator article (linked, not read. Last time I read one was a woman harping on about not wanting longer paternity leave because she's in an abusive relationship but doesn't realise it) and they question when was the last time such violence was called for; seemingly ignoring the riots and attempts to set fire to hotels last year because "migrants bad".

I'll imagine Bob Vylan will get some repercussions as per the law on this. But a careful step needs to be taken, as already the grifters are sharpening knives about "two tier policing" with the woman who got jailed relating to incitement during last year's riots.
 
Benzin said:
Politically the world is very hostile atm, and society constantly reflects that. And given what the IDF specifically are doing (given that were the targets of the chants) in Palestine openly, a rejection of their behaviour isn’t that surprising. It is NOT the same as chanting "Death to Israel/Arabs" as some circles do, as the IDF are an army force, it's akin to being anti-RAF or Marine Corp.
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All Israelis are conscripted into the IDF, so their argument is that this constitutes antisemitism. This is by design, of course.

When I saw the news of Bob Vylan's chant, my foremost reaction was to hitch up my wellys for a media s**storm that will probably last a few weeks. Calling for the death of anyone at Glastonbury wouldn't be my personal preference, but the story second to this in today's news cycle is the 32 killed in Gaza just last night by airstrikes, not to mention another few dozen gunned down while hoping to collect food and water, as has been the case daily for a month. The risk of offending public sensibility is sometimes, I think, worth it.
 
I didn't watch any of it. I've not read this topic. I'm not judging anyone who enjoyed it. Just popped in to share that a youtuber I'm watching right now has been on a rant about Glasto for the last 15 minutes. He described it as "what middle class, middle aged, HR managers do when they don't want to join Reform."

It amused me.
 
Martin said:
They were great, definitely catch up.

Great line up this year except the pyramid stage headliners. Neil Young is one of the greats of course but feels like they just saw how popular McCartney and Elton were and just went "who else from back in the day is neither dead or in prison" when they decided to book him in 2025
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He was actually booked as a 90th birthday present for Micheal Eavis by Emily.

In that sense it doesnt really matter how busy it was. As this could very potentially be Micheal Eavis' last ever Glastonbury.
 
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I have a passing interest in politics and current affairs, but would not call myself an intensely political person and would not say I have overly strong or entrenched political views.

As this is the Glastonbury thread, I also wouldn’t generally call myself a big music aficionado either… but I did see the news about this controversial Bob Vylan set.

Admittedly without knowing too much, my personal instinctive thought on the matter is that it’s right that Bob Vylan is being investigated for incitement. The question I’d ask is; why would it be right for people who said hateful things in last summer’s riots to be investigated for incitement and Bob Vylan not to be investigated for calling for death? For my money, they did the same thing, even if they are on different ends of the political spectrum. Just because someone is inciting violence for a left-wing cause, that doesn’t make it not incitement.

I’m happy to be proven wrong on this; that’s just my gut thought.

On a side note, I didn’t watch Glastonbury, but my parents and sister did and I’m currently staying in a house with them. It seems as though the Olivia Rodrigo set last night went down well (although my mum does love Olivia Rodrigo)!
 
Martin said:
Calling for the defeat of an occupying army (how can it be incitement to violence as if it's possible for anyone in the crowd to harm the iof) is not the same as inciting people to burn down mosques and hotels full of desperate people come on now
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Agree 1000%. People just getting their knickers in a twist. Welcome to 2025.
 
Martin said:
Calling for the defeat of an occupying army (how can it be incitement to violence as if it's possible for anyone in the crowd to harm the iof) is not the same as inciting people to burn down mosques and hotels full of desperate people come on now
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If they had called for the defeat of the IDF, then the situation would have been different. The press would still be making a meal out of it, but to a much smaller effect. Calling for death to the IDF, is far more problematic, it is a problematic mark-up in rhetoric.

Admittedly, that was possibly/probably the point. It is easy to make certain strands of the media clutch their pearls, but it takes something slightly more radical to get into all the national (and international press).

It remains to be seen what effect it will have, as so far any pro-Palestinian message they wanted to convey has been completely lost in the noise. So the BBC will end up answering questions, just maybe not the ones that Bob Vylan were seeking the answers to.

Anyhow, there is now a police investigation occurring. So it sounds like they are being treated the same way as the people who incited violence on the other side last summer. So everyone's been treated equally, and so... now neither end of the spectrum will be happy.
 
I admit that may have been an oversimplification on my part; I apologise for that.

But I do feel it’s a slippery slope. Where exactly do we draw the line?

I also thought the Kneecap set with the words “The only good Tory is a dead Tory. Kill your local MP.” was in very poor taste given that a Tory MP actually was killed by a member of the public in 2021.

I’m not wanting to be overly partisan here; I’d just personally prefer if we cooled temperatures a little in these debates. Absolutely express your political opinions and be passionate about causes you believe in, but I do feel that calling for death and violence does cross a line.

Maybe these political acts just aren’t my thing? Though to be fair, festivals in general aren’t my thing either…
 
Matt N said:
I also thought the Kneecap set with the words “The only good Tory is a dead Tory. Kill your local MP.” was in very poor taste given that a Tory MP actually was killed by a member of the public in 2021.
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I'm not sure if I'm misreading your implication here, but I don't believe that was repeated in their Glastonbury set. That comment was from a couple of years ago, but I think is arguably the comment that lead to Kneecap becoming a darling of the media.

From everything I've seen reported, the Glastonbury Kneecap set was relatively lacking in controversy. I think that was part of the problem, everyone was so expecting an issue to occur with Kneecap, the actual controversy caught them by surprise in the set before.

Martin said:
If he'd done "death to the russian army" not a single article would have been written and I'll leave it there
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I take your point, and agree it would be way less prominent, and probably from different sources.

But there still would have been articles... because the media need your clicks! It's not even really to do with news at this point - most newspapers don't print news any more, they create content.
 
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