Michael Eavis Q&A

[evergreenh]

I was at the Michael Eavis Q&A on Sunday and a few of the things he said may relate to some of the posts on this forum.

Firstly Ive seen a lot of posts on here talking about the younger feel of the festival audience and how this resulted in less consideration for others, more litter, and a lot of annoying laughing gas. One of the things that ME said was that he had noticed that there was a lot more dance music around the festival than ever before. Maybe this is linked to the younger audience??

He went on to say that he was not happy with the increase in dance music. He said that the Dance Village had been specifically created to contain that music style in one area, but it was obviously spreading out. He said that he intended to make moves to 'contain' dance style music in future. If he did this maybe it would change the demographic again to a slightly older audience.

Ref putting big acts as surprise guests:

He said that it was the acts decision to be surprise guests. Specifically with regards to Radiohead: Thom Yorke did not want the gig officially announced as he planned to experiment with a new direction in the music (don’t know if he did this as we couldn’t get in). He was apparently very annoyed that the Sun confirmed them as special guests on the Friday morning. Jarvis Cocker also did not want to be promoted as a confirmed guest and wanted to be a surprise guest.

Other things he said….

1. Numbers will remain the same in terms of attendees with around 135K paying tickets each year.

2. He was very pleased with the queuing system for Shangri La etc. The decision to do this was made after consultation with a crowd management specialist co, and after consulting with them it would have been foolhardy to ignore the advice. If he had ignored it and someone had been injured as a result of overcrowding it would have been catastrophic for him and the festival.

3. He is happy with Seetickets and the ticketing system

4. In previous years Comfy Crappers never took the ‘waste’ away and left it festering on the site – hence they did not come back this year

5. He was aware that the paid Security people did not have the ‘Glastonbury’ attitude, but was perplexed as to how to find 20,000 security people that would have the right attitude. The council demands this high number for licensing reasons. He felt that the security situation would be improved with NO professional security onsite.

6. He didn’t like the atmosphere around the Spirit of ’71 stage. He felt that there was no atmosphere

7. The weekend dates wont change (you cant move the summer solstice)

8. U2 – he was asked a LOT about the tax issue surrounding them – he said that it was not his job to defend Bono

9. Radiohead did the gig for free and did not get a fee

10. He was considering retiring in about 5 years. He went on to say that he felt that Emily would continue in the same direction that he followed and that they had many common values with regards to the festival. Emily is however very anti commercial sponsorship, and it was her decision to get rid of the Orange sponsorship – that had cost him £400,000. It was her intention to remove all corporate sponsorship asap.

11. Ref preferential ticketing for long term attendees – this was brought up by someone who was unhappy with the ticketing system and who felt that after having attended over 20 festivals there should be a preferential system for long-termers. ME went on to say that there were employment opportunities for 35,000 at each festival and so this was a way of long termers guaranteeing themselves a ticket.

Think that’s everything.

[Wooderson]

Just a superb post festival read.

[showmethestones]

Thanks for that, but why the f**k was the wombles question not asked!!!!!!

[Ohinever]

It's the areas around the pyramid and dance villages, especially when the weather is bad/peeps are sitting in walkways which are the biggest risk factors for disaster imho.

If Mr. Eavis is so concerned about what an "accident" could do to the future of the festival, as I am sure he is, then the major walkways need to be properly marshalled and managed.

A simple, "walk to the right" system would make a major improvement around the main stages, for starters.

Deliberating simultaneously playing big acts on various stages would also break up crowd congestion, and personally, I feel the festival would be helped immensely by about 20k less people, even if this makes tickets even harder to get.

Edited June 27, 2011 by mooro

[evergreenh]

Thanks for that, but why the f**k was the wombles question not asked!!!!!!

[Leela33]

Yes I was there too and people did seem to dwell on U2 for a while. Not really up to ME to explain U2s position.

[DTichborne]

On a safety note, had I been there I'd have asked one thing about the mud. Clearly with that weather, that size of site and that many punters, there is only so much you can do. You certainly can't put straw everywhere. But they had some to hand and therefore it would have made sense to perhaps target it in the areas where not having it was the most dangerous? The entrance to the Other Stage field from the market strip to the right of the Pyramid Stage field (as you look at it) was actually genuinely dangerous. I'm only talking about the bit on the bridge - a few square metres - which anyone could see would have made a big difference...

Just to be clear: obviously I'm not talking about doing anything about the majority of it, that would be a logistical impossibility... just a small amount of it in accident blackspots.

[mike46]

Firstly Ive seen a lot of posts on here talking about the younger feel of the festival audience and how this resulted in less consideration for others, more litter, and a lot of annoying laughing gas. One of the things that ME said was that he had noticed that there was a lot more dance music around the festival than ever before. Maybe this is linked to the younger audience??

He went on to say that he was not happy with the increase in dance music. He said that the Dance Village had been specifically created to contain that music style in one area, but it was obviously spreading out. He said that he intended to make moves to 'contain' dance style music in future. If he did this maybe it would change the demographic again to a slightly older audience.

[evergreenh]

On a safety note, had I been there I'd have asked one thing about the mud. Clearly with that weather, that size of site and that many punters, there is only so much you can do. You certainly can't put straw everywhere. But they had some to hand and therefore it would have made sense to perhaps target it in the areas where not having it was the most dangerous? The entrance to the Other Stage field from the market strip to the right of the Pyramid Stage field (as you look at it) was actually genuinely dangerous. I'm only talking about the bit on the bridge - a few square metres - which anyone could see would have made a big difference...

Just to be clear: obviously I'm not talking about doing anything about the majority of it, that would be a logistical impossibility... just a small amount of it in accident blackspots.

[budvar]

Many thanks for posting this. Foolishly I got the speakers' tent confused with the poetry and words tent...

All good news. Always a shame when people choose to ask him awkward questions on purpose (always feels to me like they're trying to prove themselves)

[DTichborne]

I keep forgetting things.

Straw - OK he has to pay for that himself and the cost of straw is very high. Different fields have different policies depending on the field management. He didnt feel that straw was very good when it comes to wet mud as it gets wet very quickly and sinks into the mud very easily. he prefers woodchip/bark and sawdust.

He said that they were very anti straw in the greenfield in particular as they generally were the best protected/preserved fields after the festival (but the furthest away for the cows to get onto, when they were released back into the farm). Apparently having wet straw on mud inhibits the growth of the grass which is why some field managers were against it.

Another thing I forgot which I thought was interesting:

Of the 135K paid for tickets, only 30K are allocated towards telephone bookings. The rest are allocated to internet bookings.

[Abster]

I keep forgetting things.

Straw - OK he has to pay for that himself and the cost of straw is very high. Different fields have different policies depending on the field management. He didnt feel that straw was very good when it comes to wet mud as it gets wet very quickly and sinks into the mud very easily. he prefers woodchip/bark and sawdust.

[Drinky]

Another thing I forgot which I thought was interesting:

Of the 135K paid for tickets, only 30K are allocated towards telephone bookings. The rest are allocated to internet bookings.

[Ommadawn]

WhenI saw them throwing straw down I did think shit how much did that cost, next yr's straw prices are going to be sky high due to the dry spring we've had. Lucky in a way there isn't a glasto next year.

Is tricky I suppose he could tarmac the whole place but the cow's will suffer more of those metal walk ways with a team clearing it might be an idea, or a rain cove like centre court at wimbledon has... hmmmmmm

[Pauljoanss]

Thanks Everygreenh for all the info. I was at the Q&A but had to leave half way thro.

To be honest I felt sorry for ME, we were all at a great festival, but it felt like he was on trial with some quite aggressive questioning, particularly on the subject of Bono's taxes and how security dealt with the protest.

Very interested to hear the stuff about dance music, it just seems to have infiltrated everywhere on site. As an example, I never heard a U2 or Coldplay track being played anywhere, which is daft because they where obviously lots of U2 and Coldplay fans on site. And what about Radiohead, from this forum you would think every glasto goer was a Radiohead fan so why are they never played on the many music systems around the site. It now seems to be the law that if you play any prerecorded music it must be dance or drum and bass type and played very loudly. What about a bit of variety and some quieter bars.

On a practical note that wood chip sawdust stuff seemed to be far more effective way of dealing with mud compared to straw which just gets trodden in very quickly.

Edited June 28, 2011 by Pauljoanss

[danvb]

Met and shook the mans hand after he did his speach at the 71 stage,was chuffed at being able to shake his hand and just say thank you to him for everything.A real highlight of the fest(and my life tbh)

I agree with him and others,the dance area is massive enough,and you dont need to much of it elsewhere unless it is very spectacular.Keep it well mixed up with the genres and not to heavy on dance,its not a dance fest!. Ide like to see a bit more soul music from various areas onsite!. I think droves of lads/hipstars/rude idiot young us come and only ever for the dance area.

I also agree with some of my age range being total morons who are not in the right mindset of being open minded,considerate and decent. I always made sure i was considerate,friendly,kept tidy,well enough behaved but still having fun.

Some do just come to say theyve gone,maybe less pop mass friendly hip headliners next time!.Bring on some legends who have real music fans as their fans.(elbow 2013?)

Eavis doesnt deserve a hard time for headliners mistakes,he doesnt have to vet each member of each band and make sure they are perfect human beings before being allowed to play,and that sort of old worn out questioning is a waste of time and opportunity.

[Oddone]

Cracking post.

[AnnaGrant]

Really interesting OP.

I was surprised to hear how many tickets had been allocated to phone sales. After the first dale in October I didn't hear of a single person who bought over the phone.

I know ME says he is happy with Seetickets and its old ground but will Seetickets do anything about the 'back button' business? I spoke to someone who said their mate had bought 30 or 40 tickets that way.

Finally, ME has given us a great festival and I really hope that he didn't feel he was in the dock about the smaller issues.

[DeanoL]

Spirit of '71 stage was just too near the Glade/ G Stage, as was Leftfield to be honest. They were drown out. Seems the most obvious example of dance music taking over the rest of the site. Well, that and all of the late-night areas (except Strummerville).

Ironically enough, after-hours the best place for indie/guitar music was the dance village, as they'd booked a load of Propaganda DJs for the silent disco.

[geebus]

Interesting post.

I watched a couple of bands on the Spirit of 71 stage and thought it had a nice friendly relaxed atmosphere.

Not very busy when I went past, but nice for what it was.

[malcombe]

I too attended the Micheal Eavis talk, but found him some what bumbling and fazed. However he did say he hadn't been to bed till 4am.

[Burrows]

I got the impression that he's not a particularly great public speaker, maybe the age is starting to get to him, he is 76 after all. That and also he's still just a farmer at the end of the day/festival, he's not used to the public grilling that our politicians have to deal with. He does seem to be quite a friendly chap though, he even recognised by name some of the regulars who had been going for decades, such as the naked lady who was sat behind me...

[evergreenh]

I got the impression that he's not a particularly great public speaker, maybe the age is starting to get to him, he is 76 after all. That and also he's still just a farmer at the end of the day/festival, he's not used to the public grilling that our politicians have to deal with. He does seem to be quite a friendly chap though, he even recognised by name some of the regulars who had been going for decades, such as the naked lady who was sat behind me...

[malcombe]

Burrows I must of been sitting right next to you. Sitting on the floor turned around to the naked woman and got a face full of bush

[staggerlee]

I think this is a very valid point, as different genres will attract different crowds

Although its not just 'younger' attendees who lack the glasto spirit, most of the ones I saw this weekend who lacked any spirit were groups of blokes easily a lot older than their teenage years!

However still had a fantastic fetival!

Edited June 28, 2011 by staggerlee