2025 Headliners

[JonSnow]

1 hour ago, NorthernSoul52 said:

Off the box, a very strong four stars for me. Will say that the momentum did seem to sag in patches, but that's just a personal opinion.

 

It blew Billie Eilish out of the water on the Friday night, and probably would top Macca were it not for the bonkers last hour of that set.

 

4/5 for me too.

 

Was my 3rd time seeing Kendrick and my least favourite out the three. But I concede a  lot of that is personal preference as I wasn't as high on Mr Morale compared to all of his other albums prior.

 

 

[richarddep]

1 hour ago, NorthernSoul52 said:

Off the box, a very strong four stars for me. Will say that the momentum did seem to sag in patches, but that's just a personal opinion.

 

It blew Billie Eilish out of the water on the Friday night, and probably would top Macca were it not for the bonkers last hour of that set.

All things considered, a very strong set of headliners!

[Someoni]

On that, KL is touring the UK in July, I know its too soon..

[charlierc]

5 minutes ago, Someoni said:

On that, KL is touring the UK in July, I know its too soon..

Kendrick & SZA co-headline tour. Two Glasto headliners for the price of one there.

[charlierc]

2 hours ago, MichaelsBeard said:

I must be in a minority and felt Kendrick’s set fell a bit flat. Maybe it’s the weight of expectation I have for him being a huge fan but I thought it was quite meh

Sometimes, if you have a huge fan and have seen them live before or obsessively watch videos of their live shows, it can have an "... eh, it's fine but it's not blowing my socks off" feeling to it. I'd felt that with Muse's 2016 and Arctics' 2023 sets at Glastonbury - still decent performances, but not really bringing anything new to the table that we didn't know already.

 

Maybe we're the guilty parties for giving Glastonbury a feeling of being a unique big must-see event show or something I dunno.

[Someoni]

3 minutes ago, charlierc said:

Sometimes, if you have a huge fan and have seen them live before or obsessively watch videos of their live shows, it can have an "... eh, it's fine but it's not blowing my socks off" feeling to it. I'd felt that with Muse's 2016 and Arctics' 2023 sets at Glastonbury - still decent performances, but not really bringing anything new to the table that we didn't know already.

 

Maybe we're the guilty parties for giving Glastonbury a feeling of being a unique big must-see event show or something I dunno.

I really didn't like the AM set, I know Alex is all American and likes to take the piss with his voice stretching and messing with timings but it just seemed so far removed from AM that it's something else now

[TheBoz]

It was an all-timer for me too with the caveat i'm a big fan of the back catalogue. I much preferred it over Macca. However it failed to win over the rest of my group who went off to PSB halfway through

[TheBoz]

5 minutes ago, charlierc said:

Sometimes, if you have a huge fan and have seen them live before or obsessively watch videos of their live shows, it can have an "... eh, it's fine but it's not blowing my socks off" feeling to it. I'd felt that with Muse's 2016 and Arctics' 2023 sets at Glastonbury - still decent performances, but not really bringing anything new to the table that we didn't know already.

 

Maybe we're the guilty parties for giving Glastonbury a feeling of being a unique big must-see event show or something I dunno.

 

Totally agree on AM at least. The 2013 set was my first headline set at Glastonbury so holds a special place, but 2023 was dire

[Andre91]

I watched Kendrick’s headline set on the TV. It’s the best headline set I’ve ever seen on TV. I was loving it at home. 

[NorthernSoul52]

At the risk of inviting ridicule, the two best G headline sets in the flesh were both Coldplay. (I went '16, '17 and '24, and saw all Pyramid bill-toppers.)

 

Worst was probably Ed Sheeran or SZA, though the former has impressed me at his own shows.

[charlierc]

2 hours ago, TheBoz said:

 

Totally agree on AM at least. The 2013 set was my first headline set at Glastonbury so holds a special place, but 2023 was dire

The contrast was there as a TV viewer too.

 

In the way, it was weirdly the opposite of my experiences. I loved the 2013 Glastonbury set on TV but found seeing it in person at Earls Court quite disappointing given there was no bass and something in the mix was off. Conversely, I had a great time at the Middlesbrough show in 2023 and thought they sounded generally good, but felt something was off for the Glastonbury one. I didn't detest it, but it felt like it was lacking stuff.

Edited February 10, 2025 by charlierc

[charlierc]

2 hours ago, Someoni said:

I really didn't like the AM set, I know Alex is all American and likes to take the piss with his voice stretching and messing with timings but it just seemed so far removed from AM that it's something else now

I'm perfectly ok with the idea that bands evolve and do things differently as they go through their careers. I don't even mind bands mixing things up with songs to suit where they are in that moment. But something about the way AM did some of the songs last year didn't hit me where I wanna live.

 

It's like 505 - on the Humbug Tour, they did a tweaked version in a different key and it sounded amazing. They totally changed the first half of it in 2023 by contrast and it sounded quite bad.

[efcfanwirral]

7 minutes ago, charlierc said:

I'm perfectly ok with the idea that bands evolve and do things differently as they go through their careers. I don't even mind bands mixing things up with songs to suit where they are in that moment. But something about the way AM did some of the songs last year didn't hit me where I wanna live.

 

It's like 505 - on the Humbug Tour, they did a tweaked version in a different key and it sounded amazing. They totally changed the first half of it in 2023 by contrast and it sounded quite bad.

It took us a surprising amount of time to work out it was 505

[charlierc]

2 minutes ago, efcfanwirral said:

It took us a surprising amount of time to work out it was 505

Oh I can imagine. The first half of the song is totally unrecognisable. I think they did a unique version for a radio session to make it sound like songs from The Car

 

Maybe the iconic status of 505 is the issue. I didn't mind the sort-of samba work done for Four Out of Five, but given how big a hitter 505 is in their lexicon, changing it that radically was a bit much.

[NorthernSoul52]

I'm all for artists reinterpreting their big hits, and nor do I feel AM have to lean hard on nostalgia for the first record. But they could have done with a couple more oldies in 2023, perhaps.

 

That being said, The 1975 binned Chocolate off during the At Their Very Best run quite happily. Didn't even make half of the shows they played on that tour.

[charlierc]

8 minutes ago, NorthernSoul52 said:

I'm all for artists reinterpreting their big hits, and nor do I feel AM have to lean hard on nostalgia for the first record. But they could have done with a couple more oldies in 2023, perhaps.

 

That being said, The 1975 binned Chocolate off during the At Their Very Best run quite happily. Didn't even make half of the shows they played on that tour.

I mean, they played 4 off Favourite Worst Nightmare, they brought back Mardy Bum and indeed they'd played View from the Afternoon at my show, so there was still some healthy enough representation from the opening two imo. Indeed, I gather it was a lot of their most played songs were making the cut. Though there is that dissonance on what people want given a lot of people seem to just wanna hear the first album when the band themselves have moved on, somewhat understandably given we're talking about 20 year old songs by this point and Alex Turner f**king sings differently for one.

 

I don't know if AM is oldie enough at this point, although tbf, I've heard Do I Wanna Know on Radio 2 so it might qualify by this point.

 

It's certainly different to when I saw the Antarctic Monkeys tribute act and the majority of the set was first two albums.

Edited February 10, 2025 by charlierc

[TheFieryFurnace18]

AM were great 23'. One of my favourite ever sets 

[northernangel]

1 hour ago, TheFieryFurnace18 said:

AM were great 23'. One of my favourite ever sets 

I read this as 13 at first lol, nah 23 I pretty think I enjoyed maybe 5 songs but in comparison to 13 it wasn't up to standard but I also didn't expect it to be. I went to hear what I needed to. 

Don't play anything later than than 2013 and between 2007 and then sparingly lol.

 

You're welcome though to have enjoyed it.

[thatTFBguy]

2 hours ago, TheFieryFurnace18 said:

AM were great 23'. One of my favourite ever sets 

glad you enjoyed it, but wow, couldn't disagree more. Glastonbury was among the worst shows of that tour even. Not even compared to 2013, just even compared to the rest of that summer

[Physical_graffiti]

10 hours ago, thatTFBguy said:

glad you enjoyed it, but wow, couldn't disagree more. Glastonbury was among the worst shows of that tour even. Not even compared to 2013, just even compared to the rest of that summer

I agree 2023 felt flat and lacking energy, though I loved 2013 and they've been class at other gigs I've seen them in their modern era....but in their defence didn't they cancel Dublin the week before so they could play glastonbury as alex's voice was going or something. Not really any consolation but this was probably psychologically holding him back from giving his all and affected the gig. Like anything though, a band you like is giving a slightly flat performance of songs you like, you're probably still loving it after a few beers.

[lendan]

10 hours ago, thatTFBguy said:

glad you enjoyed it, but wow, couldn't disagree more. Glastonbury was among the worst shows of that tour even. Not even compared to 2013, just even compared to the rest of that summer

I agree. I was really looking forward to seeing them for the first time and we left after 30 minutes, so disappointed. 

[charlierc]

1 hour ago, Physical_graffiti said:

I agree 2023 felt flat and lacking energy, though I loved 2013 and they've been class at other gigs I've seen them in their modern era....but in their defence didn't they cancel Dublin the week before so they could play glastonbury as alex's voice was going or something. Not really any consolation but this was probably psychologically holding him back from giving his all and affected the gig. Like anything though, a band you like is giving a slightly flat performance of songs you like, you're probably still loving it after a few beers.

I'd forgotten about the Dublin cancellation issue tbf. I saw them in Middlesbrough about 2/3 weeks before Glastonbury and thought they were great, but obviously I got Alex's voice before all that. Although tbf I don't think his voice sounded notably off during Glastonbury.

Edited February 11, 2025 by charlierc

[StuwieG]

2013 Monkeys was amazing, watched the back loads of times. Perfect timing of AM just coming out. 
 

2023 was awful. So disappointing. My memory is hazy but he didn’t he have to announce they were playing 505 as no1 recognised it? 

[charlierc]

1 hour ago, StuwieG said:

2023 was awful. So disappointing. My memory is hazy but he didn’t he have to announce they were playing 505 as no1 recognised it? 

He does chant "5" "0" "5" over the intro looking back at the video.

 

I agree you wouldn't be able to recognise it at first given the drums are faster. Which is perhaps the weird paradox given Alex is singing it slower.

[fullfathom5]

Really enjoyed AM in 2007 and 2013. 2023 though, awful.