11 things we learnt at Glastonbury 2024 — triumphs, disasters and celebrity cameos

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As the pale-faced ghosts of this year’s Glastonbury revellers trudge towards the buses, staggering under filthy-clothes-stuffed backpacks yet resiliently humming Viva La Vida, our critics round up the best — and the worst — of this year’s festival. From Dua Lipa’s dance moves to Tom Cruise’s love for Coldplay, from surprise guests and wildly misleading rumours to election fever and Euros ecstasy. We genuinely miss it already.
Whether it was due to the rival attractions of Avril Lavigne and the England v Slovakia Euros match, Monáe’s set was hugely under-attended. Which was a massive shame because the Kansas singer’s performance was the highlight of the weekend. She can do the lot — sing, rap, dance, write her own songs, look great in a tux. And her rousing speech in support of “marginalised people” everywhere made the on-stage chat of Dua Lipa and Coldplay’s Chris Martin look rather banal. How unfair that Monáe has yet to truly cut through while vastly less-talented artists get headline slots and huge sales. Let’s hope word of mouth spreads and her show is a hit on the iPlayer.
Princess Beatrice, a regular Glasto-goer, was spotted at a motorway service station en route. She was in M&S, obviously. Paul Mescal was vibing out to Charli XCX, while Sienna Miller, Anya Taylor-Joy and Cara Delevingne could be heard hollering for LCD Soundsystem. Later, Billie Piper and Alexa Chung graced the Park stage bar. A baffled Dakota Johnson had a pre-festival pint in a local pub with her boyfriend Chris Martin. Elsewhere, we saw a tank-teed Andrew Scott, Benedict Cumberbatch and Bear Grylls. Oh, and among the Coldplay crowd were Gillian Anderson, Simon Pegg and some guy called Tom Cruise.
• Sunday at Glastonbury 2024 — as it happened
Last year’s headline glut of mature males — Guns N’ Roses, Elton, Yusuf/Cat Stevens — arched a few eyebrows. Clearly, festival boss Emily Eavis took note because this year, the future felt female. There was a bona fide pop princess (Dua Lipa), a global R&B star (SZA), a clutch of ascendant stars from Little Simz to Olivia Dean and Noname, nostalgic noughties favourites such as Sugababes and old-school queens Cyndi Lauper and Shania Twain. In the dance tents, too, women ruled the decks: Charli XCX, Romy, Shygirl, Sofia Kourtesis … ladies, would you let the poor men have a go?
• Saturday at Glastonbury 2024 — as it happened
Speaking of Sugababes, they proved so popular that security had to shut access to their stage, relegating furious fans to watch from the bins. Crowd size seems to have been a particular challenge on Worthy Farm this year. Obviously it always is — 200,000 people shacking up in a few fields — and total respect for the logistical feats required. But there were a few cases where it felt like an act had ended up on entirely the wrong stage. The Pyramid crowd for Sunday’s odd-choice headliner, SZA, was notably moth-eaten. Latecomers to Jarvis Cocker and Avril Lavigne faced a similar fate to the Sugababes fans — never underestimate millennial nostalgia. Hundreds of Charli XCX fans were packed into the tiny Levels venue with no bars and no loos, and the late night dance kingdom Block9 is so oversubscribed that the access road is periodically shut from about 10.30 each night. Too many people, too much fun — maybe the Eavises could call in some fluid dynamics experts to sort things out next year?
• Friday at Glastonbury 2024 — as it happened
Who’s the special guest, the secret set, the surprise? When it comes to minor shake-ups to the concrete-clad schedule, Glastonbury-goers love to conjure up mystery and rumour. Unfortunately, the reality doesn’t always live up to the hype: Dua Lipa fans, dreaming of last year’s headliner Elton John, with whom she shares a song, were a little deflated to be confronted instead with a scruffy T-shirted and spaced-out Kevin Parker of Aussie psychedelic band Tame Impala. And don’t get us started on Charli XCX’s boyfriend, George Daniel of the 1975, who pumped ten minutes of dirge into an otherwise perfect set.
Luckily there were plenty of creative and exciting surprises: Robyn and Romy vibed out with Charli, Norman Cook (aka Fatboy Slim) joined his fellow former Housemartin Paul Heaton for a rendition of Happy Hour while Mel C and the Glastonbury stalwart Tilda Swinton came on (separately) with the electronic duo Orbital. Elsewhere Lianne La Havas cooed with Michael Kiwanuka, and Fred Again, every Gen-Zer’s favourite electronic pin-up, popped up for a intimate ambient set high above the farm on the gorgeous Strummerville stage.
Previously Glastonbury has laid on giant screens to show tournament matches but this time it was assumed people could follow England v Slovakia on their phones. You wonder if the organisers were also worried about the music acts losing punters to the football. Some shows, from Seventeen to PJ Harvey, were quite sparsely attended, even without competing with Harry Kane et al.
Coming up with a flag slogan brings out the best in Glastonbury goers. The doozies this year ranged from the ironic (“Annoying flag”) to the understated (“Not too bad”), the cryptic (“Gary”), the pragmatic (“Looking for a man in finance”) and the purely pictorial (Bob Mortimer holding a small fish). The Peep Show and Coldplay universes collided in a flag showing David Mitchell’s Mark saying: “Five headline sets Chris? Five? That’s insane.” And finally there was the enterprising chap who plugged his lawn maintenance services with the genius “I’m sexy and I mow it”. Bravo.
• Saturday at Glastonbury 2024 — as it happened
The festival was rife with moonlighters on stage and behind the decks, from the BBC presenter Ros Atkins who played a well-received drum and bass DJ set, to Mr Gladiator himself, Russell Crowe, whose amiable acoustic tent performance put us in mind of a better class of pub band. The former Times journalist and current Sky News technology correspondent Arthi Nachiappan, who spun dancehall, reggaeton and more. Fish 56 Octagon, the pseudonym of a middle-aged marketing professional who has reinvented himself on social media as a champion of retro dance music, played a set at the Glade Dome that he described as “the moment of my life so far”.”
Most poignantly, Coldplay brought out the actor Michael J Fox, whose film Back to the Future, Chris Martin said, inspired him to make music. Fox has Parkinson’s and is in a wheelchair but he strummed along movingly to Fix You. Grown men cried (really).
• Victoria Canal was bullied at school. Now the pianist is playing Glastonbury
Everywhere you looked the Tories were getting it in the neck, whether it be in badly punning banners (“Fishy Sunak, crime minister”) or a mock funeral in which a coffin emblazoned with the words “End of the Conservative project” was accompanied by mourners in Boris Johnson and Liz Truss masks. The Irish Republican hip-hip trio Kneecap led choruses of “Free Palestine” and “Get your Brits out [of Northern Ireland]” while Jarvis Cocker finished his DJ set with Alexis Taylor of Hot Chip by whipping up an enthusiastic chant of “Get the f***ing Tories out”.
Amusingly, indie rock band the Last Dinner Party urged us all to have some “f***ing compassion” and go out to vote on “June 4.” Whoops. The most powerful political statement came from a Banksy stunt: a blow-up raft packed with life-jacketed dummy refugees which sailed across the crowd. As for Sunak’s potential successor? He’ll be pleased to hear he earned a very Glastonbury-style salute, in a flag adapting a Coldplay song title: “A Sky Full of Starms”. The irony prize was won by the speaker in the Shangri-La field who urged us to smash capitalism — but also to buy some merch.
All the world’s a stage — and this year at Glastonbury, every stage was a world. We can’t remember a recent edition that was so gloriously, eclectically international. Among those represented: South Korea (affable if underwhelming K-pop band Seventeen), Peru (glamorous DJ Sofia Kourtesis), Nigeria (Afrobeats star Burna Boy), Cuba/Mexico (Camila Cabello), Australia (Confidence Man), Pakistan (Arooj Aftab), and Jamaica (the Skatalites). Finally, Indonesia were represented by Voice of Baceprot, who one hack claimed were the best heavy metal band he had seen since Metallica.
“I love the energy that you guys are bringing,” drawled Dua Lipa, who was born in north London but apparently with a Californian soul. Even more disconcertingly, Chris Martin sounded like Cliff Richard as he showed his appreciation for the “bewd-iful British crowd”.