Glastonbury 2023

I guess the organisers are more flexible with dates than for their first few decades. You can blame Emily Eavis for any changes, or confusion. 😄

Anyone ever see the footage of the fella hang-gliding into Glastonbury.

The over crowding issues are site wide. Like every food stall with a massive queue. The actual gigs themselves are always fine. Before and after maybe not so much but there isnt any danger at the gigs themselves of a crush.

I'll leave it at this as I'm sure people are getting annoyed coming in expecting to see reviews and just getting a back and forth between us.

1971 doesn't support your stance that Glastonbury is timed to be the weekend after the solstice. Your Sky History link notes "By 1971, the festival was renamed The Glastonbury Fayre and the date was moved to coincide with the summer solstice." From what I can see it ran from Sunday 20th to Thursday 24th June. This is neither a weekend nor after the solstice.

I think the first year that the festival happened after the solstice was on its 7th occurrence in 1984. This event was not repeated until the 12th occurrence in 1990. They took a break in 1991 after the riots the previous year to decide on the future of the festival. I suspect that during this time the decision was reached to hold the festival to include the last Sunday/full weekend in June as that has been the case since.

About the only way I can fit the solstice into a description of when Glastonbury is held is as follows.

The weekend after the summer solstice where June 21st is used as a proxy for the actual solstice date and weekend is defined as including Friday in addition to Saturday and Sunday.

Keep the solistice posts coming guys, fascinating stuff!

😁😁

I think it's more things like queueing for food, toilets, showers etc has increased a lot. Also the SE corner has crowd problems. Particularly last year but this year seems bad also.

I went a few times when I was younger so read forums now after the festival to see what's new. I actually only enjoyed it I think the first time, it seems like something you endure rather than enjoy.

It might be a change in demographic rather than numbers. I think before people were quite happy to explore the site and not too bothered about the acts and headliners.

I'm not sure but consistently veterans have complained of overcrowding. Maybe it's just perception due to age.

Also it seems to be full of scousers.

Apologies for the length.

I’d urge you to give it another try as I don’t think it’s the festival you remember and is actually much better than you believe. I’m one of those veterans you refer to and for me it’s a festival that’s successfully evolved, particularly from the mess it got into in the late 90s.

Of course come edginess is gone but it’s comprehensively safer and crowd crushes are no longer likely. There could have been deaths at the Manics on the main stage in ‘99. The band had to stop three times. New barriers and a golden circle were put in after that. Narrow bridges were knocked to prevent bottlenecks and anti-flooding measures were taken in the late 2000s which thus far seem to be working. It’s a better and far more creative festival than it ever was and there are astonishing things around every last corner of the site.

The SE Corner gets very busy on the Thursday night particularly when everyone seems to head there but it’s not as bad as ten years ago when they had to put up barriers to hold people out, often for 2-3 hours. Moving Arcadia has lured many away as has more stuff on at the Glade, Silver Hayes and Park. They’ve also greatly expanded the SE area and it’s still busy but you can easily get around in a way you couldn’t in 2013/14.

I agree that it can be an endurance test if the weather turns bad and it’s always tiring but there’s a reason why so many of us are willing to trek large distances to both get there and get around the site. It’s simply cos it’s so bloody rewarding. Plenty of bland fare on the two main stages but it really doesn’t matter when you’ve do many other choices.

As per @robinph i also head for the shortest food queues, even if I’m often opting for blander stuff. There’s rarely a queue at the stalls opposite the entry ho the Acoustic Stage and West Holts not crazily busy either. I waited no more than 10-12 mins for any stall last year.

The demographic hasn’t greatly changed either. Lots of younger faces but they’re not the majority, not by a long way. The attendees are across all ages, plenty of them in their sixties and seventies. And there may have been a fair few Scousers and Mancs in the late 90s but far less so these days. It’s very varied and you’re as likely to come across Irish nationals as denizens of any major British city.

In short, it’s peerless and it keeps improving. If the weather is right you’ll have your best weekend of the year.

The Specials story is great. I’d have loved that.

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Performance art/acting/roadie stuff/voluntary bar work the only way people I know got freebie tickets to get involved who aren’t musicians. But it isn’t easy. Everyone is trying.

Correct. I was there and I think I'll be in recovery mode for a while yet, but I'll answer the questions you asked and am happy to answer any more people may have. Not sure I'm able to write a full review though!

I went with with my daughter. We were both first-timers - me 46 and her 19.

We drove from Sligo on Monday evening to get the Dublin-Holyhead ferry at 2am on the Tuesday morning (€191 for the 2 of us and the car, each way). Drove down to London on the Tuesday to stay with a cousin and get one last sleep in a bed. Also had to collect a few supplies for the weekend.

Left London at about 8am on the Wednesday for the drive down to the farm and arrived at around 1pm (could have got there sooner, but we had a couple of stops for food, etc on the way and I took a slightly longer route in order to get onto the west side of the site). We were directed into one of the furthest car parks from the pedestrian gates and had quite a walk to get into the site. We took our rucksacks and loaded our camping gear onto a trolley and decided to get in and camped, and come back for the beers. Not gonna lie, the trek in was a slog. It had rained earlier so the tracks in were a bit muddy, but it was starting to get pretty hot otherwise, and we had to stop once or twice on the way in.

No queues for the ticket checks so we got in really quick, but I just wanted to get camped and rest up for a few minutes before going back for the beers, so we found a spot not too far from the gates. It was a little too close to the compost toilets for my liking (I can actually still get the smell now!), but we were also close to a couple of food stalls and the place was filling up really quickly so we went for it. Probably could have got a better spot if we went further out, but I really couldn't face lugging all the gear much further.

You read people saying how big Glastonbury is, but until you are actually there, you can't really comprehend it. It is **** massive.

The heat was a bit oppressive for me, but that really isn't a complaint, because the things I saw and more importantly, the people I met and chatted to more than made up for that. It really is an amazing place, filled with amazing people that are all just happy to be there and part of the greatest party on earth. It's so much more than the music and what you see on television, while amazing, doesn't do the place justice.

Best part of the weekend for me, was my daughter saying to me on the Sunday, "Daddy, if we don't get tickets for next year, we should volunteer to work it". I agreed.

Got there for my first time last year, at the grand old age of 56, and it was beyond fantastic. I'll never forget the pure elation I experienced from the minute I got the wristband. The people working there, the volunteers, the punters - 'sound' doesn't come close to the level of friendliness. And the site itself ... beautiful and vast. It is definitely one of the best experiences of my life. That elation hasn't gone completely, Glastonbury gave me a wonderful boost after those horrible pandemic times. If I never get to go again I'm OK with that .... but I'll keep trying in the ticket lottery in the autumn and the spring re-sale, just in case.

... and register, if you are even only half thinking about trying for tickets, it's free, simple and doesn't generate spam or anything like that. Register just once and you're good for several years (ten, I think, and it's easy to change your photo if you want). In all the years I dreamed of going, I never bothered to register and get interested pals to register, which was really stupid of me, considering the massive desire to go.