Why Glastonbury hasn't sold out this year...

[almostwitty]

So it's Glastonbury weekend - a weekend where I traditionally muse on the fact that I'm starting to get too old to go to such a weekend as a first-timer, and that I really need to get off my backside, and make arrangements to go.

Except this weekend, if I really wanted to go by myself, I could - tickets are still available for a festival that usually sells out within the first day of tickets being made available. Scalpers are probably walking the hills of Pitdown bereft and blaming the credit crunch.

Some commentators blame the lack of sales on poor weather, although most of them are blaming it on the fact that rapper Jay-Z is headlining what used to be a rock music festival. Although since the Pet Shop Boys have also headlined it in the past, I'm not sure that excuse stands up.

An element of the truth may be heard in a work conversation I overheard, where someone expressed a genuine fear that because a rapper was headlining, the crowd would essentially be full of chavs and violent gangsta dudes. Which therefore meant this person wasn't going, because he/she was afraid of all the violence that would ensue.

and there was me thinking Glastonbury was meant to be a haven of openness, love to your fellow man, and meeting cool new people and all that.

Then again, one of my friends is working it this year, and she's taken a 12-pack of condoms...

Comments

Thoughts on the overall crowd...

[choirgrrl.livejournal.com]

I don't know if the festivals are continuing on the same path they were a few years ago, but I had some friends that went to an outdoor rock concert some time back, and ended up leaving early. Seems the people in the crowd were getting to riled up, and somewhere along the line it became fashionable to throw full bottles of water. My friend's wife got hit in the head 2 or 3 times, and everyone else was trying their damnedest to avoid the others that seemed to fly through the air every 5 seconds or so.
How does this tie in to Jay Z? It technically doesn't, but it does tie in with worries of violence- at least on a small level.