After Saturday’s packed line up, there was no let up on the third and final day of live music. The Pyramid Stage has a reputation to open each day with a random selection of music. Sunday was to be no different, as we started our day off with The Burtle Silver Band. They attended to start things off by personal invitation by Michael Eavis himself (who you could see to the side of the stage enjoying the performance). But Glastonbury isn’t just about the music. We found ourselves at Speaker’s Corner near the Healing Fields after that to watch a performance by comedian Ruby Wax. She was debuting a brand new show in which she is about to tour. The tent isn’t all that big, so it was a real pleasure to see her speak in such a close and personal environment. As always she was funny, neurotic and totally loveable.
The next act couldn’t be more different. Patti Smith was performing The Pyramid Stage. I know the word legend can often be overused, but there is simply no other word that can be used to describe such a woman. Now approaching her seventieth year, and still has all the rock and roll prowess of a woman in her twenties. She plowed through tracks such as ‘Gloria’ and ‘Redondo Beach,’ before inviting the Dali Lama to join her on stage. It was the weekend of his eightieth birthday and she got the crown singing happy birthday to him whilst he cut a cake she presented to him. After that he gave us a speech about the importance of finding peace, both in the world and with each other. He is a truly inspirational man, and this was a great chance for him to project his message to a larger audience. He spoke earlier that day in the the Healing Fields, but most of the night time dwellers will no doubt have still been asleep at that time, or maybe just crawling in from the night before. Florence Welch was just a few foot away from us during Patti’s set, singing along and dancing. No doubt getting in some well deserved chilling time after her turn on The Pyramid the previous night. The whole set was one of the hilights of the whole festival for me. During the end of her set, she took an epic fall at the back of the stage. The whole crowd held their breath, waiting to see if the veteran rocker would get up again. She did, and laughed it off saying, ‘So I fell on my ass at Glastonbury. That’s because I’m a f*cking animal’. She closed her set by paying tribute to Sunday night headliners The Who, playing their huge anthem ‘My Generation,’ whilst ripping the strings off her guitar.
The next legend followed Ms. Smith on The Pyramid Stage was Lionel Richie. The turn out was phenomenal. It has been said that out of the 175’000 festival goers, 120’00 were there for Lionel (It’s full capacity). Wouldn’t you hate to be one of the other bands playing the same slot on a different stage? The amount of people with Lionel Richie puns on both T-shirts and flags was unbelievable. Fans weren’t to be disappointed. During his hour long set he played pretty much every classic hit I can name, plus a load more I’d forgotten about. Songs like ‘Dancing On The Ceiling’ and ‘All Night Long’ got everyone dancing. But there was one song that everyone was waiting for. ‘Hello’. The sound coming from that field was deafening. Everyone of all ages were singing along, to an astonished Lionel. It was his Glastonbury debut, and it was obvious from his face that he was feeling the love. During the set, one festival goer took crowd surfing one step further by surfing across a sea of hands in a dingy. It all went so well until it tipped backward and she disappeared into the crowd. Luckily she was in one piece and got back in to surf back to where she came from.
Lionel Richie couldn’t have been followed by a more different group. Alt-J took to the stage to a packed field to play tracks from their two albums, opening up with ‘Hunger Of The Pine’. Their chilled out wonky-pop sounded great on a sunny day. From there it was back to John Peel to see new pop kid on the block Charli XCX. Her set started early, so unfortunately we missed the first few tracks. The setlist was made up mainly of tracks from her new album ‘Sucker,’ but also featured her huge hit for Icona Pop ‘I love It,’ as well as the Iggy Azalia track ‘Fancy’ in which she recently featured on. It all finished as expected with her huge soundtrack hit ‘Boom Clap’.
The next big surprise for me at this year’s festival was Death Cab For Cutie. I knew a few of their songs, but hadn’t really paid much attention to them. More fool me. Throughout their massive eleven track set, they dazzled me, along with rest of the crowd, finishing with their epic track ‘Transatlanticism’. Though I knew little of them before, I will take them away from me and have well and truly found a new favourite band.
The last set of the day (and the festival) came from Franz Ferdinand and Sparks collaborative project FFS. They are two bands who I would never have put together, but in a strange way it really worked. Their set was made up of tracks from their joint album, as well as FF tracks ‘Do You Want To,’ and ‘Take Me Out,’ and Sparks’ monster hit ‘This Town…’ The whole set was entire madness, theatrical and over the top. It was the perfect way to close proceedings.
Glastonbury has never just been a festival. It’s a whole way of life. I am now suffering the Glastonbury hangover; being indoors, sleeping in a bed, and not spending my days sat around in muddy fields. Roll on 2016.
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