Music festival industry heavyweights are uniting to encourage 18-34 year olds to vote in next month’s UK general election.

Taking place just days before the country goes to the polls, Glastonbury Festival will host an exclusive, interactive ‘Crash the Party’ on site installation, reminding festivalgoers to turn out to vote the week after the event.

Glastonbury and Crash the Party are also running a competition to win two tickets to this year’s festival, where entrants who are registered to vote and sign up for reminders about key election moments could be in with a chance of heading to Worthy Farm.

The Crash the Party movement is part of Just Vote – a campaign urging young people to get out and vote on 4 July. Melvin Benn, MD of Festival Republic, which runs Reading & Leeds Festival, is among the industry leaders throwing their support behind the Just Vote campaign.

“Reading & Leeds are among the country’s biggest gatherings of young people and sit at the very heart of our youth culture,” says Benn. “In bringing these festivals to life I have the privilege of witnessing the next generation’s energy and passion first-hand and it is vital that their voices be heard at the general election. The music industry has always been an important force for positive change and working with Just Vote is a great way to empower our audiences to channel their energy into exercising their democratic right at this historic moment.”

Festival Republic is also providing tickets as competition prizes, only available for entry to those who are registered to vote.

“This is the most important general election of our lifetime, and the UK music scene has immense cultural influence which can mobilise young people”

The brainchild of green entrepreneur Dale Vince, Just Vote will feature visuals created by advertising firm Saatchi & Saatchi.

“We’re grateful to Festival Republic, Glastonbury and all the participating festivals for throwing their weight behind Just Vote,” says Vince. “This is the most important general election of our lifetime, and the UK music scene has immense cultural influence which can mobilise young people to make their voice heard on 4 July.

“We’re also calling on the UK’s musicians to use your platforms to rally young people to register and then get out and vote. Artists playing these festivals – if you see this please get involved and help spread the word about the Just Vote campaign: the future of our country depends on young people having a say.

“Last year, a single post by Taylor Swift got 35,000 Americans registering to vote. We in the UK have such a long history of mobilising people through music, so there’s no reason our home grown talent shouldn’t be doing the same.”

Crash the Party Participants to date include: 4AD, Acid Box Promotions, A Greener Future, Anjunadeep Open Air London, Association of Independent Festivals, Association of Independent Music, Beggars Group, Believe, Belladrum Festival, Bella Union, Boomtown Festival, Carl Loben, Editor DJ Magazine, Creative Artists Agency (CAA), Creative Zero, Deer Shed Festival, Drift Records, ERA, EarthPercent, The FAC, The F List , Festival Republic, Forwards Festival, Glastonbury Festival, Green Gathering Festival, Heavenly Recordings, In Place of War, IQ Magazine, Ivan Milivojev, John Robb, Kilimanjaro Live, KMJ Entertainment, LIVE, Love Saves The Day Festival, LS Events, Matador Records, MMF, Modern Sky Records, Music Declares Emergency, Music Venues Trust, NNA, Ninja Tune, Night Time Industries Association, The O2, OVO Arena Wembley, Proper Productions, Reading & Leeds Festival, Rough Trade, Save Our Scene, Secret Garden Party, Silver Hayes, Sound City, Stephen Budd Music, Superstruct, Team Love, UK Music, UK Music Futures Board, WOMAD, XL Recordings, Xtra Mile Recordings, Young Recording.

Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

Only a “very limited” number of tickets will be available in Glastonbury Festival’s upcoming 2024 resale, organisers have announced.

The initial sale sold out in just under an hour last November, as “demand greatly exceeded supply” for the more than 140,000 public tickets. Festival ticket and coach packages were also snapped up in 25 minutes.

General sale tickets cost £355, plus a £5 booking fee, with successful applicants required to pay a deposit of £75 per person upfront, with the remaining balance due in the first week of April.

Tickets for which the balance was not paid will be made available in the resale from 6pm BST on Thursday 18 April for ticket & coach travel options, and 9am on Sunday 21 April for general admission tickets.

“As in previous years, the exact number of tickets in the resale will not be announced. But it is a very limited amount,” says the UK festival. “Demand is expected to significantly outweigh the number of tickets available.”

Any cancelled accommodation options, covering Worthy View, Sticklinch and campervan/caravan passes, will be made available at 11am on 21 April.

Coldplay, Dua Lipa and SZA will headline Glastonbury 2024

Coldplay, Dua Lipa and SZA will headline this year’s event, which will take place at Worthy Farm, Somerset, from 26-30 June. The bill will also include the likes of LCD Soundsystem, PJ Harvey, Little Simz, Burna Boy, Janelle Monáe, Cyndi Lauper, Michael Kiwanuka and Seventeen, while Shania Twain will occupy the coveted Sunday teatime “legend slot”.

A recently published report measuring the economic impact of Glastonbury Festival revealed that last year’s event cost £62m to stage. The Economic Impact Summary 2023 was commissioned by organisers of the UK festival and carried out by research specialist Fourth Street.

The report, which was based on a survey of 643 festival-goers, plus an online survey of 354 staff and 148 volunteers – along with 30 telephone interviews with local businesses – found Glastonbury to have a “significant positive economic impact”, both nationally and locally, generating around £168m of income for UK businesses including £32m for Somerset-based businesses.

Artists such as Elton John, Arctic Monkeys, Guns N’ Roses, Lana Del Rey, WizKid, Lizzo, Blondie and Cat Stevens starred at the 2023 event.

Festival-goers were estimated to have spent £1.6m in the wider Somerset community, 50% of which was spent in local shops and supermarkets. Around 900 attendees stayed in local hotels and B&Bs during the event, contributing around £450,000, with 4,000 staying in privately-run offsite campsites, spending in the region of £6.5m.

Glastonbury made payments in excess of £3.7m to a range of charitable causes and campaigns in 2023.

Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

A new report measuring the economic impact of Glastonbury Festival has revealed that last year’s event cost £62 million (€72m) to stage.

Held at Worthy Farm in Pilton, Somerset, in June 2023, the legendary UK festival welcomed more than 140,000 ticket-holders for high-profile sets from the likes of Elton John, Arctic Monkeys, Guns N’ Roses, Lana Del Rey, WizKid, Lizzo, Blondie and Cat Stevens.

Entertainment was provided at over 100 stages across five days, with general sale tickets priced £335.

“The total cost of putting on the 2023 Glastonbury Festival was approximately £62 million, paid across 922 organisations providing services to the festival,” says the report. “Included in this are the materials and infrastructure that bring the fields to life; all the crew creating the build and managing the stages; and costs for the staff that work for the festival throughout the year.

“Of this £62 million spent by the festival, just under £12 million was paid to 258 companies in Somerset.”

The Economic Impact Summary 2023 was commissioned by organisers of the UK festival and carried out by research specialist Fourth Street. It was based on a survey of 643 festival-goers, plus an online survey of 354 staff and 148 volunteers, along with 30 telephone interviews with local businesses.

The report found Glastonbury to have a “significant positive economic impact”, both nationally and locally, generating around £168m of income for UK businesses including £32m for Somerset-based businesses.

Festival-goers were estimated to have spent £1.6m in the wider Somerset community, 50% of which was spent in local shops and supermarkets. Around 900 attendees stayed in local hotels and B&Bs during the event, contributing around £450,000, with 4,000 staying in privately-run offsite campsites, spending in the region of £6.5m.

Glastonbury made payments in excess of £3.7m to a range of charitable causes and campaigns in 2023

Crew working for Glastonbury were estimated to have spent about £900,000 with local businesses outside the event during their time on site, while festival volunteers are estimated to have spent a further £500,000. There were more than 10,000 volunteers in 2023.

The festival also sustained more than 1,100 UK jobs in total, 325 of which were based in Somerset. An additional 1,750 people worked directly for the event over shorter periods of time.

Glastonbury made payments in excess of £3.7m to a range of charitable causes and campaigns in 2023, while its raffle of Glastonbury tickets for Oxfam’s Crowdfunder DEC Appeal raised more than £1m towards the Syria-Turkey Earthquake response, and an online auction of tickets raised £116,000 for the Trussell Trust. The festival has also built 52 social housing homes in Pilton.

Coldplay, Dua Lipa and SZA were confirmed last week as headliners for Glastonbury’s 2024 edition, which will take place from 26-30 June. Shania Twain will occupy the coveted Sunday teatime “legend slot”. The bill will also include the likes of LCD Soundsystem, PJ Harvey, Little Simz, Burna Boy, Janelle Monáe, Cyndi Lauper, Michael Kiwanuka and Seventeen, who will become the first K-pop act to perform on the Pyramid Stage.

Tickets sold out in just under an hour last November, with organisers saying “demand greatly exceeded supply”.

The festival’s long-term future at Worthy Farm was secured last year after it was granted permanent planning permission by Somerset Council.

Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

Glastonbury Festival organisers have received a series of recommendations from Somerset Council on how to improve the event in 2024.

Following a meeting of the licensing authority’s communities scrutiny committee on 13 December, the council’s head of regulatory services Dave Coles said this year’s festival “overall was very well-run”, but added that “continuous improvement” was required.

Suggestions include improved crowd control, clearer allergen information, better walkways and additional toilets and water refill stations at The Park and The Stone Circle areas, according to the BBC-backed Local Democracy Reporting Service.

Held at Worthy Farm near Pilton, the legendary UK festival was headlined by Arctic Monkeys, Guns N’ Roses and Elton John in 2023.

Organiser Glastonbury Festival Events says it accepts the council’s recommendations ahead of next year’s festival, set for 26-30 June. The lineup will be revealed in early 2024.

“We will be reviewing the feedback and recommendations given in the report, and will continue to work closely with local authority and agency partners”

“We were very pleased with the local authority’s overall feedback that the event was ‘once again well-planned and managed’,” says a spokesperson. “As always, we will be reviewing the feedback and recommendations given in the report, and will continue to work closely with local authority and agency partners throughout the planning and delivery of next year’s event.”

The festival’s long-term future at Worthy Farm was secured earlier this year after it was granted permanent planning permission by the local council. Somerset Council succeeded Mendip District Council as the event’s licensing authority following the abolition of the latter in April.

Tickets for next year’s Glastonbury sold out in just under an hour last month, with organisers saying “demand greatly exceeded supply”. All tickets for the 2024 event had been bought on 19 November by 9.57am GMT – a few minutes quicker than last year’s onsale but slower than 2019’s record of 34 minutes. Festival ticket and coach packages sold out in 25 minutes on 16 November.

General sale tickets cost £355 (€410), up from £335 in 2023 and £265 in 2019. There will be a resale of any cancelled or returned tickets in the spring.

Glastonbury recently announced it will have made payments of more than £3.7 million (€3.4m) to charitable causes and campaigns in 2023 by the end of the year. In addition, its Oxfam Crowdfunder DEC Appeal raised over £1m towards the Syria-Turkey Earthquake response, and an online auction raised £116,000 for the Trussell Trust.

Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

The BBC has revealed its TV coverage of this year’s Glastonbury festival reached a record-breaking 23.1 million people.

The figures, which include the 30-day catch up period, were up 8% on 2022’s figure of 21.4m, with 8.6m people tuning in to Elton John’s Sunday night headline performance on BBC One over the same period.

Other high-performing sets at the 21-25 June event included Arctic Monkeys, Guns N’ Roses and Yusuf/Cat Stevens, as well as Blondie, Rick Astley, Fred Again.., Foo Fighters, Becky Hill and Lewis Capaldi. Glastonbury 2023 content on BBC iPlayer and BBC Sounds has also now been streamed 65 million times, up 54% on last year’s figure.

“This was an incredible year at Worthy Farm and I’m proud that we successfully matched the ambition and spirit of this iconic festival with our extensive coverage of it,” says BBC director of music Lorna Clarke.

The BBC, which recently inked a multi-year extension to continue to as Glastonbury’s exclusive multimedia broadcast partner, delivered over 40 hours of coverage across its TV channels in 2023, as well as 85 hours of live radio broadcasts, content on BBC Sounds, and an increase in scale and accessibility on BBC iPlayer.

“It’s wonderful that record audiences discovered and enjoyed our Glastonbury output on TV, radio and online”

For the first time, the corporation also streamed Pyramid Stage performances live in British Sign Language.

“It’s wonderful that record audiences discovered and enjoyed our Glastonbury output on TV, radio and online, as I know the teams across the BBC and BBC Studios worked around the clock to bring more performances and content than ever before to people at home,” adds Clarke. “A special thanks to Emily and Michael Eavis for allowing us to share the joy of Glastonbury with so many people across the UK.”

Glastonbury’s long-term future at Worthy Farm was secured earlier this year after it was granted permanent planning permission by the local council.

The festival will return to Worthy Farm, Somerset, from 26-30 June 2024.

Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

Tickets for the UK’s Glastonbury festival sold out in just over an hour, despite a 26% price increase for the 2023 edition.

The Glastonbury onsale failed to beat 2019’s record of just 34 minutes due to a “technical problem”, as organisers reported “incredible demand” for the 135,000 weekend tickets. Coach packages sold out in just 22 minutes last Thursday.

“Demand far outstripped supply”

“Although we are thrilled that so many of you want to come to next year’s Glastonbury, we’re sorry that a huge number of people missed out on a ticket this morning – because demand far outstripped supply,” tweeted co-organiser Emily Eavis.

“Thank you for everyone who tried to buy a ticket. Your loyalty to this festival is deeply appreciated. There will be a ticket resale in spring 2023, so if you didn’t get one, please do try again then.”

General sale tickets cost £335 (€385) for 2023, up 26% on the £265 (€304) charged when tickets last went on sale in 2019. Tickets were subsequently rolled over until 2022 when the 2020 and 2021 festivals were cancelled due to the pandemic.

“We have tried very hard to minimise the increase in price on the ticket but we’re facing enormous rises in the costs of running this vast show”

“We have tried very hard to minimise the increase in price on the ticket but we’re facing enormous rises in the costs of running this vast show, whilst still recovering from the huge financial impact of two years without a festival because of Covid,” says Eavis on Twitter.

“In these incredibly challenging times, we want to continue to bring you the best show in the world and provide our charities with funds which are more vital than ever.”

Glastonbury previously posted a loss of £3.1 million for the year ending March 2021, according to Companies House documents.

Billie Eilish, Paul McCartney and Kendrick Lamar headlined the festival’s 2022 edition. No acts have yet been announced for the 2023 event, which is scheduled for 21-25 June.

Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.