Emily Eavis has dropped a couple of massive headliner hints ahead of tickets for the Worthy Farm festival going on sale next week.
According to the festival’s co-organiser, the team are still in the process of deciding on headliners for 2024, but she hinted that next year’s Worthy Farm bash could well end up being dominated by women.
Eavis is the daughter of Glastonbury’s founder Michael Eavis, and began running it alongside him in 1999. Speaking to Annie Mac and Nick Grimshaw on their podcast Sidetracked, she gave a handful of clues about what to expect next summer.
As well as revealing that a high profile US artist has been in touch, she confirmed that next year’s legend’s slot on Sunday afternoon will feature a female artist. It’s currently looking like two out of the three headliners will also be women.
Though she did not reveal the identity of the artist in question, rumours have been swirling around a potential Madonna headline show after Eavis attended her recent Celebration tour at The O2. Coldplay, Dua Lipa, and Harry Styles are also leading currently as potential contenders at the bookies.
“2024 is still a little up in the air…” she said. “And I thought it was kind of taking shape and then last week I just got a call, and this is what happens if you wait a little longer, because quite often we’ll be booked up from July. This year we’re holding out for a little bit longer and last week I got a call from a really big American artist saying this person’s around next year, and I was like oh my God, this is incredible, thank God we held the slot.”
Last year’s Glastonbury was criticised for featuring an all-male line-up of headliners, and Eavis explained that this was due to a female artist pulling out of a booked headliner slot and being replaced with Guns N’ Roses.
“I’ve always been really passionate about gender split and I think actually, our problem was that I’d been so outspoken about it that having a year where there wasn’t a female sent people a bit mad, or some people,” she said. “And actually we did have a female, she pulled out and we replaced them with Guns on the Saturday.”
“It’s top of my list,” she continued. “I’m always trying to make it the most balanced, diverse bill. It is difficult with female artists because there aren’t enough headliners. But we’re also creating them. We’re putting the bands and female artists on smaller stages and bringing them through all the time so I feel like the pool is going to be bigger soon. And who knows next year we might get two… And certainly I can say that the legend is female.”
Tickets for Glastonbury go on sale next week; a stressful occasion for anyone wanting to head to one of the most famous festivals in the world. Eavis told MacManus and Grimshaw that she’s always relieved when they’re over.
“I’m normally here in the office with the team here, and we’re in constant communication. I’m so relieved when it’s over and it’s gone without issues,” she said. “It’s really hard with that volume of people. One of the main issues is that each household has about seven devices on the case, so it’s really intense the amount of people trying and the amount of devices trying. But if everyone has one device per household, it just makes it much smoother.”
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Sidetracked with Annie and Nick is available every Thursday on BBC Sounds
