R&L 2027

[korokband]

5 hours ago, Benj said:

A month plus since the last post on here, just 4 months from the festival and when one finally came it’s spam 🤣

 

Maybe not a sign that the festival is dead as something of true cultural significance but deffo one that it is for people who populated this messageboard!

 

There’s so few acts playing that we can’t even moan about how few are playing, yet alone predict who might be added

Even the festival itself barely seems to be alive looking at social media etc, especially in comparison to Download who really seem to have hit a home run this year.

 

That being said, Reading looks like its selling alright, and anything that isn't day tickets for the Florence / Chase & Status day will probably sell out. Leeds on the other hand seems very flat, so I really think it might be time to question whether or not there will even be a Leeds next year.

[northernangel]

On 10/04/2026 at 17:25, archiegow said:

 

Absolutely amazed to see them, Rosé and Jennie (solo and not with Blackpink) all considered headliners but Yungblud still isn’t! Also I notice Foals have been downgraded from the headliner pool.

Tbh Yungblud with this years lineuo is the last option I would see then considering 

[Benj]

40 minutes ago, korokband said:

Even the festival itself barely seems to be alive looking at social media etc, especially in comparison to Download who really seem to have hit a home run this year.

 

That being said, Reading looks like its selling alright, and anything that isn't day tickets for the Florence / Chase & Status day will probably sell out. Leeds on the other hand seems very flat, so I really think it might be time to question whether or not there will even be a Leeds next year.

 

Yup, as a 'festival' Leeds is clearly dead at the current prices for the current offering.  It will be interesting to see what kind of crowd it does manage to get in to see if it will be around in 2027, without it being heavily subsidised by Reading



 

[JimMacVeigh]

The decline of this festival needs to be studied. Absolutely insane how it’s fallen off a cliff. 

[charlierc]

34 minutes ago, JimMacVeigh said:

The decline of this festival needs to be studied. Absolutely insane how it’s fallen off a cliff. 

Everyone will have their theories tbf. I don't think there's any one answer - I think its a mix of things like the failed twin main stage experiment, the divergence from its historic rock-focused bookings, the fact that rock crowd now has a lot of smaller and cheaper festivals to play with, appealing to a crowd that may have done V Festival back in the day only to find people just aren't into that, charging Glastonbury-level ticket prices for an experience that isn't quite at that level or just not finding a niche at present.

[Ben7amin_]

My own two cents on this -  (admittedly coming from someone who has not been in ages, sorry ).  I think perhaps they are trying to be a jack of all trades festival - and perhaps being the master of none.  Whatever people preferred theming/line up/environment for a festival - their will almost certainly be a different one better suited to their tastes.   While yes the sum total of Leeds/Reading might be a bigger set of names on the line up,  are they really gonna get the dedicated Indie kids away from Bearded Theory thats around £100 cheaper - with probably more music they are interested in,  see also Creamfields, Shambala etc etc.....

[Benj]

3 hours ago, Ben7amin_ said:

My own two cents on this -  (admittedly coming from someone who has not been in ages, sorry ).  I think perhaps they are trying to be a jack of all trades festival - and perhaps being the master of none.  Whatever people preferred theming/line up/environment for a festival - their will almost certainly be a different one better suited to their tastes.   While yes the sum total of Leeds/Reading might be a bigger set of names on the line up,  are they really gonna get the dedicated Indie kids away from Bearded Theory thats around £100 cheaper - with probably more music they are interested in,  see also Creamfields, Shambala etc etc.....

This is the problem and why the festival has died attraction wise, it’s not that it’s suddenly trying to be a jack of all trades that is what it always was and it strength.

 

The problem is with the lineup cut in half, it simply can’t fulfil that promise anymore 

 

At its peak it had 6 music stages, including 3 stages catered to specific genres, supplementing the bigger, genre diverse names on the main stage and large second stage.

 

While the two large stages are somewhat maintained, one has become far more genre focused while the diversity offered elsewhere has disappeared.

 

Where once there was normally always one or 2 things you’d be more than happy to watch at any one time, were suddenly left with 3 or 4 things a day.

 

Like you say, why pay 350 quid to go to Reading and put up with all the downsides of a mass scale festival, when there are no longer any upsides?

 

The people on this forum have certainly voted with their feet.

 

 

[charlierc]

On 19/05/2026 at 07:39, Ben7amin_ said:

My own two cents on this -  (admittedly coming from someone who has not been in ages, sorry ).  I think perhaps they are trying to be a jack of all trades festival - and perhaps being the master of none.  Whatever people preferred theming/line up/environment for a festival - their will almost certainly be a different one better suited to their tastes.   While yes the sum total of Leeds/Reading might be a bigger set of names on the line up,  are they really gonna get the dedicated Indie kids away from Bearded Theory thats around £100 cheaper - with probably more music they are interested in,  see also Creamfields, Shambala etc etc.....

It's probably not been helped by the fragmentation of this stuff. All Points East gets lots of stuff that I think would've been Reading bookings back in the day, as do Victorious Festival, the other Superstruct events and to a degree Gunnersbury Park.

 

Like I said, it's charging Glastonbury level prices for a strange grab bag without cohesion. I was hoping to see Florence and the Machine, for instance, but I can't say there's a lot of acts on her day at this I'm also up for seeing. Maybe Holly Humberstone after I thought she was cool on SNL, but two acts in about 20 isn't going to be make me throw £120 at it. 

[korokband]

Glastonbury money while offering rather weak headliners and reduced stages would be what I'd blame. I do not understand why the one "new" thing that they have announced for 2.0 is a stage that is nearly completely populated by acts that are playing Creamfields. If you like that kind of music then you would just go see the same acts at Creamfields instead.

[Benj]

11 hours ago, charlierc said:

It's probably not been helped by the fragmentation of this stuff. All Points East gets lots of stuff that I think would've been Reading bookings back in the day, as do Victorious Festival, the other Superstruct events and to a degree Gunnersbury Park.

 

Like I said, it's charging Glastonbury level prices for a strange grab bag without cohesion. I was hoping to see Florence and the Machine, for instance, but I can't say there's a lot of acts on her day at this I'm also up for seeing. Maybe Holly Humberstone after I thought she was cool on SNL, but two acts in about 20 isn't going to be make me throw £120 at it. 

Exactly. There is too much competition now to put on a festival like Reading once was, yet they still share the same for half the product. 
 

Fair f**ks if they can still get people to turn up and pay 3-400 quid for it and scrape together a daily program people are happy to spend 120 quid before travel accom and booze etc.  
 

I fear there will be diminishing returns when they have to start rotating the level of acts they can now attract, when people realise they can see them on tour for half the price and not have to stand outside in the rain

[jonnyisRFC]

On 18/05/2026 at 17:03, korokband said:

Even the festival itself barely seems to be alive looking at social media etc, especially in comparison to Download who really seem to have hit a home run this year.

 

That being said, Reading looks like its selling alright, and anything that isn't day tickets for the Florence / Chase & Status day will probably sell out. Leeds on the other hand seems very flat, so I really think it might be time to question whether or not there will even be a Leeds next year.

Careful, I mentioned them potentially getting rid of Leeds on here once and I got slaughtered 😂

[jonnyisRFC]

Agree with pretty much everything that’s been said above. Charging the same as Glastonbury is bonkers, Glastonbury offers 100x more than R/L in terms of music and general entertainment. Readings stumbling block with the modern day festival goer is the 11pm curfew, they used to get away with it when they had 6/7 packed out stages, but now they’ve cut all that in half it leaves a lot to be desired. 

[wghennessy]

6 hours ago, jonnyisRFC said:

Careful, I mentioned them potentially getting rid of Leeds on here once and I got slaughtered 😂

I think it probably will and should happen. I love close by and I don't know anyone who's going or who's remotely arsed. 10 years ago it was anything but. The festivals on its arse.

[stanh]

Reading seems to have sold really well this year from the posts they've made re. tickets. I don't think it's going anywhere anytime soon, I think for the vast majority in here (myself included) it just doesn't cater to us. That said, if I was still under the age of 18 I'd be thrilled with the Reading lineup this year (not so much Leeds). 

[Steve G]

They should just throw the money at Oasis and it be a guaranted sell out regardless who else is playing. 

[Benj]

5 minutes ago, Steve G said:

They should just throw the money at Oasis and it be a guaranted sell out regardless who else is playing. 

The other two days and campsite would only be half full though

 

and it would cost them way more than taking artists on the back end of tour cycles that they can seemingly wrap up and sell to people on day trips (Reading anyway)

[EvanLittle]

Feels like Leeds getting axed is just a matter of time now, and to be honest, it might be the only way to save Reading. The whole twin-site format just feels proper dated and way too expensive to run nowadays. If they scrapped Leeds and focused entirely on Reading, turning it into a proper London-adjacent day-trip fest for the younger crowd like All Points East or Wireless, it would actually make sense financially. But yeah, for the old-school rock crowd, the R&L era is completely dead and buried.

[craigcharles420]

I feel like it's just us being old tbh. Festival is doing fine. Never seen anything to suggest either site is doing badly, let alone on the brink of being scrapped.

Edited 12 hours ago by craigcharles420

[andyrhodes24]

5 minutes ago, EvanLittle said:

Feels like Leeds getting axed is just a matter of time now, and to be honest, it might be the only way to save Reading. The whole twin-site format just feels proper dated and way too expensive to run nowadays. If they scrapped Leeds and focused entirely on Reading, turning it into a proper London-adjacent day-trip fest for the younger crowd like All Points East or Wireless, it would actually make sense financially. But yeah, for the old-school rock crowd, the R&L era is completely dead and buried.

Location doesn’t matter too much, both events will draw a chavvy roadman crowd with this lineup, although Bramham Park is well out of the way so that’s an issue in itself but the day ticketers still turned up in droves last year.

 

The two issues for me are that at Leeds they’ve shoehorned random acts like Blossoms and Jamie Webster into a pop lineup, and price. It’s £130 a day for a lineup catered to teens who won’t be spending £50+ on beer per day. Is that sustainable for FR?

[Benj]

2 hours ago, craigcharles420 said:

I feel like it's just us being old tbh. Festival is doing fine. Never seen anything to suggest either site is doing badly, let alone on the brink of being scrapped.

I don't think a whole raft of attendees who've been going every year since the mid 90s and mid 10s collectively all thinking the festival is no longer for us suggests we've all aged out of it at the same time.

Something fundamental has changed and its pretty obvious what that is.

The fact that theyve managed to skinny down the line up so much AND STILL get punters in is a real credit to the bookers, filling it with enough of the current thing to get the kids excited for a weekend while pulling in enough big names to make it worth a day out for the casual Florence fan etc... is impresive.

Re Leeds: Annecdotally, from videos, numbers have looked tiny vs Reading, esp on the camping end of things, it would be good to know the official numbers and how much they're down from the peak sell out years

[craigcharles420]

33 minutes ago, Benj said:

I don't think a whole raft of attendees who've been going every year since the mid 90s and mid 10s collectively all thinking the festival is no longer for us suggests we've all aged out of it at the same time.

Something fundamental has changed and its pretty obvious what that is.

The fact that theyve managed to skinny down the line up so much AND STILL get punters in is a real credit to the bookers, filling it with enough of the current thing to get the kids excited for a weekend while pulling in enough big names to make it worth a day out for the casual Florence fan etc... is impresive.

Re Leeds: Annecdotally, from videos, numbers have looked tiny vs Reading, esp on the camping end of things, it would be good to know the official numbers and how much they're down from the peak sell out years

I remember the videos from last year at Leeds but it seems they may have been misleading as it apparently drew over 90k over the weekend. I really do think this is just is not being the target audience anymore. I understand why you disagree but it's just how I feel about it.

[Benj]

3 hours ago, craigcharles420 said:

I remember the videos from last year at Leeds but it seems they may have been misleading as it apparently drew over 90k over the weekend. I really do think this is just is not being the target audience anymore. I understand why you disagree but it's just how I feel about it.

90,000 on a single for day or over the weekend?

 

if it was for the whole weekend that’s disastrous

 

Given camping didn’t sell out unless they in effect transferred a lot of camping captivity to Chappell Roan day tickets 90,000 is absolute capacity there I think, so it would be hard to believe

 

i think it’s from the year before but the TPD tv footage when the killers are headlining makes it look like it’s at best half full