EE interview

[TheRedSeat]

Haven't seen this mentioned anywhere but there's a fairly substantial interview with Emily in the Times today

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/arts/music/article4452985.ece

Does seem to emphasise that Michael doesn't have much involvement at all in booking bands. Quotes him as asking 'any news on the bands' fairly often. Also amazing that there were apparently 80,000 tickets still available in April for the 2008 Festival

(awaits grumbling about having to pay to read a newspaper online)

Edited May 28, 2015 by TheRedSeat

[JoeyT]

Maybe some kind soul will copy and paste the interview in to here?

[stuartbert two hats]

Can any subscribers copy+paste the article?

[Spindles]

If anyone who is willing to pay money to Murdoch want's to cut/paste the text that would be great, please and thank you.

*edit* lol at everyone having the same thought.

Edited May 28, 2015 by Spindles

[mungo57]

If anyone who is willing to pay money to Murdoch want's to cut/paste the text that would be great, please and thank you.

*edit* lol at everyone having the same thought.

this in its entirety.

Fuck Rupert Murdoch and his bullshit fucking newspapers.

Any subscribers please copy and paste!

[ThomThomDrum]

Does she mention her Hunter Wellies in it?

[TheRedSeat]

It literally costs a pound to get access for a day to read it.

[mozzy]

It literally costs a pound to get access for a day to read it.

It's not the amount it's the principle.

[eFestivals]

Does seem to emphasise that Michael doesn't have much involvement at all in booking bands. Quotes him as asking 'any news on the bands' fairly often.

he hasn't really had much of a role in bookings since (at least) before Emily was much involved. He has professionals to do that.

He's probably more out of the loop now tho on just what he gets to hear from no longer being at the centre of things.

[Sawdusty surfer]

It literally costs a pound to get access for a day to read it.

Wouldn't give Murdoch the steam off my piss, never mind a quid.

[neil999]

no wonder michael was so worried when there were 80k of tickets left! amazing turnaround...

[TheRedSeat]

It's not the amount it's the principle.

That's fine and I didn't post the link with any intention of getting into this sort of debate but if people want to read it they can find it and it's easy enough to access.

[Spindles]

It's not the amount it's the principle.

This entirely.

That's fine and I didn't post the link with any intention of getting into this sort of debate but if people want to read it they can find it and it's easy enough to access.

Sorry for making you feel dragged into the debate, no one is looking at you personally and judging, I am sure.

Edited May 28, 2015 by Spindles

[Titters2]

Why is EE giving interviews to Murdoch papers??

[Spindles]

Not everyone holds the strong views that some of us do. NI publications represent a significant portion of the market share.

[dentalplan]

That's fine and I didn't post the link with any intention of getting into this sort of debate but if people want to read it they can find it and it's easy enough to access.

Why won't you copy and paste the article?

[mozzy]

That's fine and I didn't post the link with any intention of getting into this sort of debate but if people want to read it they can find it and it's easy enough to access.

IF you're happy to give money to Murdoch.

[Spindles]

Cut the chap/lady some slack folks. This isn't their fight and they only came here to let us know about the interview, no obligation or affiliation implied in their post.

[stuartbert two hats]

This entirely.

Sorry for making you feel dragged into the debate, no one is looking at you personally and judging, I am sure.

I am.

[Spindles]

I am.

Ah crap, now I feel out-leftied.

[hjglasto]

Rattling along the dirt tracks of Worthy Farm in Emily Eavis’s slightly battered red camper van with the windows open to the warm, blossom-blowing wind, it’s hard to imagine a more idyllic spring scene. Next month all this will be tents, mud-crusted music fans and mosh pits, but today the start of construction on the main pyramid stage and the latrine-digging operations are the only signs that this is the home of the Glastonbury Festival.

This Vale of Avalon idyll was soured recently in an online outpouring against Eavis that was personal and nasty in a peculiarly Twitter-age way. Her decision to book the American rapper Kanye West to top the bill on the Saturday night of the five-day festival provoked an outcry. An online petition describing his appearance as an “insult to music fans” and calling for a rock band to replace him has more than 133,000 signatories.

“It was not a pleasant world we unwrapped,” says Eavis, the co-organiser of the festival with her father, Michael, its founder. “I had death threats and stuff. It was just horrible. It was just crazy.”

The festival is rooted in peace, love and goodwill to all in the Mendips, but controversy has become a routine accompaniment to the announcement of acts at Glastonbury. “The scrutiny is daily. Whatever we do is torn apart and scrutinised and analysed. It’s quite hard to really concentrate on the job because you can easily get distracted by the hoo-ha.” The organisers were criticised for booking the rapper Jay Z, Beyoncé, Metallica, even the Rolling Stones.

Eavis has tended to ignore the fuss, but the outcry over West, who is married to the reality TV phenomenon Kim Kardashian, was so great that she had to address the decision. “It was getting out of control. We had Time magazine, all the American news channels saying they were going to come down. This incredible onslaught worldwide. It was quite upsetting because we were talking about something that was so exciting and interesting and fresh and brilliant for the festival. Kanye West is making the most exciting music at the moment. He is an amazing force as a performer. For us getting the biggest star in the world was an amazing coup.”

Some claimed it was not appropriate for a rapper to appear at the festival. Given that Glastonbury caters to every conceivable music taste this seems odd. Others objected to his highly developed ego and occasionally obnoxious behaviour towards other artists, which hardly seem disqualifications for performing at a music festival.

Some saw an opportunity to renew attacks on West for his remarks, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, that President Bush “doesn’t care about black people”. This was clearly an idiotic statement and he apologised. “We do not get involved in people’s politics,” says Eavis. “Can you imagine? We wouldn’t book anyone.”

Eavis is anxious that the reputation of a festival that has become a summer institution is vulnerable. Although tickets this year sold out in record time, “it is not going to be like that every year. Things change so quickly. Now it is quite hard to imagine but it was only in 2008 that it didn’t sell out and we had 80,000 tickets left in April. That was incredibly stressful. It’s cyclical. It doesn’t take much for a negative story to gain momentum.”

Eavis appears to wear the burden of organising the festival lightly. For two hours there is hardly a moment she isn’t smiling. I suppose that is probably the benefit of living year-round at Glasto.

The Glastonbury baton is slowly being passed from Michael, 79, to Emily. She and her husband, Nick Dewey, are in charge of the day-to-day business of booking bands and supervising the enormous logistical exercise involved in running a festival with 135,000 ticket holders and a crew that will eventually grow to about 50,000 during the days of the event.

Michael remains the bearded face of the festival and takes a keen interest in the nuts and bolts of the infrastructure. He has suggested he will completely let go of the reins in 2020 on its 50th birthday. “He says something different every day,” says Emily. “It works well. A lot of the detail we are interested in, he is not. He is very interested in . . . the toilets for example.” Compost is the way forward. Eavis has just spread her garden with compost created from festivalgoers’ dung from two years ago.

Michael has moved out of the farmhouse that has been in the family for more than a hundred years into a new home he has built up the hill. Emily’s sons, aged four and two, are the sixth generation to live on the farm. “He takes my boys out every morning at 8 o’clock; takes them around the farm. Some days he will say: ‘Any news on the bands?’ We spend a lot of time saying: ‘Don’t worry, we’ve got lots of bands. We are going to be all right for the next ten years.’ A couple of years ago he was very gloomy about it. We said: ‘Really, don’t worry, we are going to be OK.’ ”

Next year’s headliners are already booked, although Emily Eavis won’t say what they are. She says that Glastonbury’s fees aren’t as big as some festivals, but artists are attracted by its heritage and the small matter of the boost to record sales that comes from BBC TV coverage and other media exposure. Last year Dolly Parton, the biggest Glastonbury draw yet, rocketed back into the charts. “She was on the front cover of every paper on the Monday after the festival.” Eavis says that big stars rarely make ridiculous demands. “I think they know they are coming on to a farm. Even Dolly was like, ‘I love mud!’ ”

Glastonbury has a turnover of more than £35 million. After £2 million is given to charity the bulk of the profits are ploughed back into running the event, but “everyone makes a living out of it”, says Eavis. Over the years the festival has sometimes supported the award-winning dairy farm and sometimes the opposite has been true. “Now they are both doing well.”

Administration of the festival has been revolutionised by the construction of a smart new block of offices for about 20 permanent staff. The decor is boho-chic, with old Glastonbury posters and photographs adorning the walls. “This is a whole new idea — an office space,” says Eavis, in a tone that suggests they have only just stopped convening at the stone circle on the farm. Sadly not. “Previously everything was done around the kitchen table.”

Eavis says that there is still a politically “left-wing” element at the festival but “it is never going to be as political as it was because it is not the Eighties. We have people from all political persuasions. We are not aligning ourselves with anyone particularly but we are open to ideas and debate.” She was invited to a Downing Street event last year but couldn’t go because it was the day after the festival ended.

Some moan that Glastonbury, with its security fence, supermodels in designer wellies and luxury tents, is not what it was and has been colonised by the haves and the have-yurts. Eavis says that most of the glamping is off site, run by neighbouring farms. “We charge less than the expensive tents on the outside.”

She grew up watching her parents run a very different event. “It was the Wild West — the unpredictable nature of it. It was a bit more tribal. People would come from different parts of the country and be here for longer periods and there were more dealers around. It was definitely a bit more on edge.”

Emily Eavis would watch through the farmhouse window as casualties were brought in to the welfare office. “I saw everything. I never got into drugs. It put me off for life. It was a great anti-drugs lesson. I have no problem with people doing things, but in those days it was slightly more out of control. I think because of the kind of dealers there was a lot of dodgy stuff going around.”

Sometimes people would stay for weeks to recover. “There was one called Ann Marie who stayed with us for a month. We had this guy called Simon who in those days would drive them all over the country because you wouldn’t want to put them on a train.”

In 1990 there were running battles between travellers and security teams, but crime at the festival last year was at its lowest. “It is a city the size of Oxford and the crime would be a fraction of what they have on a Saturday night,” Emily Eavis claims.

Michael used to run the festival with his second wife, Jean, Emily’s mother. When she fell ill Emily returned home from university where she was training to be a teacher and helped her dad after Jean’s death.

She met Dewey, a music promoter, while organising an event for Oxfam about 15 years ago. She says that he has made them more ambitious about which guests they try to hook. She would like to see Adele and the Grateful Dead play at Glastonbury, but thinks her hopes of Prince coming are probably forlorn.

Even if she did secure such a coup, people would no doubt bitch about it. Recently it was announced that the Who would close the festival this year and immediately people started moaning about the choice and that the band appeared to have reneged on a deal to play in Paris on the same night to be in Somerset. The band have rescheduled their Paris show to June 30, two days after they play Glastonbury.

“The Who are a legendary, weighty, British rock band and we are very fortunate to have them come and play here,” says Eavis. “So many brilliant songs and a class act.”

She may not hear many of those songs. She isn’t one for hanging out backstage with the stars and doesn’t get to do much chillaxing during the festival. “I have moments of real excitement and enjoyment but most of the time it is quite full on. There is a constant flow of things to sort out.” And she’s not just talking about the loos.

EDIT: for the record, I hate Murdoch as much as anyone else but it's £1 and I wanna read an Emily Eavis interview.

Edited May 28, 2015 by hjglasto

[Badlands]

Do you all boycott The Simpsons as well?

[Badlands]

"The scrutiny is daily. Whatever we do is torn apart and scrutinised and analysed. "

Ahem...

[Spindles]

Do you all boycott The Simpsons as well?

Never paid a penny towards watching it, like all media I just steal it off the internet (well, I used to when it was funny).

@hjglasto, thanks for the post and taking one for the team.

[TheRedSeat]

Why won't you copy and paste the article?

Aside from the fact I would imagine there's some sort of copyright theft / other legalities involved (don't profess to be an expert in this but if we're bringing principles into it...) I'm personally happy to pay for something that I think is worth it and I get some value out of. If someone on here was allowing lots of other people to use all the benefits of their efests gold membership without having to sign up I imagine Neil or someone would have something to say about it and rightly so.

I also find it odd that anyone would make a stand over paying a quid but happy to read the same paper as long as it's free but that's just me and each to their own. Only posted to throw it out there that was an interesting Glastonbury piece available that had info people might want to know in it.