The legendary Glastonbury Festival has become one of the most iconic and revered music festivals within the music community. Since 1979, the festival has drawn hundreds of thousands to Pilton, England’s Worthy Farm, the remote and scenic grounds the festival is hosted on, to enjoy a wide variety of music’s biggest acts.
While anyone who’s visited the English countryside knows just how beautiful it is, you’re also familiar with English weather. You’re lucky to go more than a day without being caught in the rain. Add that with nearly 200k people and a lot of mud, and you begin to get a sense of what Glastonbury looks like by the end of the weeklong festival.
In an effort to preserve the grounds for future generations, festival founder Michal Eavis announced that the new festival location may have to be moved in 2019, heading about 100 miles “towards the Midlands,” giving the grounds (which happens to be Eavis’ own farm) time to recover and avoid natural deterioration.
While the announcement might ruffle some festival-goers’ feathers, Eavis reassures patrons that the move is only temporary. “I’m arranging to move the show [but] it would be a huge loss to Somerset if it went there forever…I don’t want to lose it forever, no way.”
Additionally, the new location would help the festival avoid the break-year they take every five years. While that year is typically reserved for both the land and organizers to rest and regather themselves, the secondary site would allow the festival to continue annually.
In the meantime, potential attendees can look forward to Radiohead headlining the 2017 festival, as long as acts The Stone Roses, Kraftwerk and Ed Sheerhan rumored to be a part of the lineup.