The Killers and the Cure have been announced as the final headliners of the 2019 Glastonbury festival. Brandon Flowers’ Vegas band will headline on the Saturday, and Robert Smith and co on the Sunday. They join the previously announced headliner Stormzy, who will close the Pyramid stage on Friday night.
It is the Cure’s fourth time headlining Glastonbury, following slots in 1986, 1990 and 1995. They join Coldplay as the only groups to have headlined the festival four times.
Down the bill, there are first-time Glastonbury appearances from Janet Jackson, Lauryn Hill and Miley Cyrus, among others. Liam Gallagher will follow his packed Other stage show at Glastonbury 2017, and Christine and the Queens returns for her second Glastonbury, having provided a flash of European optimism with her debut at the 2016 festival, the day after the UK voted to leave the EU.
Quick GuideWho runs the Glastonbury festival?
Show
Who runs the Glastonbury festival?
The first "Glastonbury festival" was staged by the then 34-year-old Michael Eavis on the site of his family dairy farm in the village of Pilton in southwest England – about 6 miles from Glastonbury Tor – in 1970. The festival was held intermittently until 1979, when it became a (largely) annual event, and Eavis now organises it with his daughter Emily through the company Glastonbury Festivals Limited. (From 2002 until 2012, promoter Melvin Benn assisted the Eavises with operations and licensing.) Emily and her husband Nick Dewey book the acts for the main stages and oversee the management of the festival's many areas. Each year, the festival donates around £2 million to Oxfam, Greenpeace and WaterAid. The Guardian has been the festival's media partner since 1997.
Bands including Tame Impala, Vampire Weekend, Two Door Cinema Club and Hot Chip are likely to debut material from their respective hotly anticipated new records. The Streets, Damon Albarn’s the Good, the Bad & the Queen and Snow Patrol represent an older generation of British groups, while Years & Years, Bastille and Idles shore up the younger contingent.
There is a strong showing for the crop of young, game-changing pop stars: the goth-pop icon-in-the-making Billie Eilish joins the hip-hop and flute polymath Lizzo. The Spanish flamenco trap musician Rosalía, Norwegian power-popper Sigrid, British producer Shura and Fiona Apple-endorsed King Princess also perform.
The UK rap scene is well represented with Stefflon Don, Little Simz, Kate Tempest, Loyle Carner, Slowthai and Bugzy Malone, as is the burgeoning international jazz community with Kamasi Washington and Britain’s Sons of Kemet and the Comet is Coming. Britain and Ireland’s male singer-songwriter set is represented by George Ezra, Hozier, Rex Orange County and the socially conscious guitarist Sam Fender.
Read the full line-up below. Glastonbury is expected to announce the rest of the bill closer to the festival itself, which takes place from 26 to 30 June on Worthy farm, Pilton.
The latest additions join a smattering of previously announced acts. Janelle Monáe will headline the West Holts stage. Kylie Minogue will play the Sunday teatime “legends” slot, previously filled by artists including Dolly Parton and Barry Gibb. It will be the first time Kylie has played a solo set at Glastonbury. She was due to headline the Pyramid stage in 2005 but had to cancel after a breast cancer diagnosis.
Following the death of Keith Flint, Emily Eavis said the Prodigy had been booked for 2019. The group have since cancelled all forthcoming dates.
The organisers recently announced that the festival would no longer sell single-use plastic water bottles, in an attempt to cut waste and limit the event’s impact on the environment. In 2017, festivalgoers used more than 1.3m plastic bottles.
“We have been working on this during the year off,” Emily Eavis told the Guardian. “We spent a lot of time in 2018 working on the logistic side, speaking to suppliers and market managers, area organisers.
“We are tackling drinking bottles at the moment, water bottles … and we are encouraging people to bring their own reusable bottle, but there will also be reusable bottles available on site.”
Michael Eavis recently told Somerset Live about how his Methodist values had influenced Glastonbury. “Non-conformism is something that has definitely shaped me, and I think you can see that reflected in the festival,” he said.
The festival recently funded the construction of new social housing in the village of Pilton, which Eavis called “the best thing” he had ever done.
Tickets for this year’s Glastonbury sold out in half an hour. The festival returns after a fallow year in 2018. It will celebrate its 50th anniversary in 2020.
The Glastonbury line-up so far
The Killers
The Cure
Stormzy
Kylie
Janet Jackson
George Ezra
Liam Gallagher
Miley Cyrus
Tame Impala
The Chemical Brothers
Vampire Weekend
Ms Lauryn Hill
Janelle Monae
Christine and the Queens
Two Door Cinema Club
Jorja Smith
Bastille
Hozier
Sigrid
Snow Patrol
Cat Power
Wu-Tang Clan
Anne-Marie
Years & Years
Billie Eilish
The Good, the Bad & the Queen
Hot Chip
Stefflon Don
Jon Hopkins
Santigold
The Streets
Lizzo
Kamasi Washington
IDLES
Rosalía
Johnny Marr
Diplo
Mavis Staples
Rex Orange County
Little Simz
Michael Kiwanuka
Kate Tempest
Loyle Carner
King Princess
Jungle
Neneh Cherry
Kurt Vile & the Violators
The Comet is Coming
Interpol
Pale Waves
Friendly Fires
Sharon Van Etten
Pond
Sons of Kemet
Aurora
Fat White Family
Sheryl Crow
Maribou State
Fatoumata Diawara
Bugzy Malone
Slowthai
Low
Sam Fender
This is the Kit
BCUC
Shura
Comments (…)
Sign in or create your Guardian account to join the discussion