Even though thousands of acts have played at Worthy Farm there isn’t that many songs about Glastonbury. I have looked far and wide and I have found 8 so far. In no particular order, here is the Best Songs About Glastonbury.
Beans On Toast – Can’t Get A Gig At Glastonbury
We first discovered Beans On Toast at The Secret Garden Party in 2010. He was playing in a small tent standing on a chair. We loved him straight way. He is a brilliant songwriter and hilarious on stage.
Can’t Get A Gig At Glastonbury is clearly written by someone who gets Glastonbury. He talks about areas of the festival that only people who have been know about.
Ironically, Beans On Toast is now a regular at Glastonbury. He plays every year and draws a huge crowd. I always recommend people go and watch him. We have met him a few times, most recently in The Greenpeace Field at Glastonbury 2023. He is exactly the same off stage as he is on.
Can’t Get A Gig At Glastonbury Lyrics:
Glastonbury festival is changing.
They got a new system in place
everyone’s gotta wear a barcode, wrapped around their wrist
and in order to get a ticket you must register yourself with a photograph, proof of address and a proportion of your wealth
Well I’ve been at the stone circle for many a-sunrise, I’ve watched it light up the Pyramid, the green fields and block 9.
I remember when Shangri La was still called Lost Vaugueness and admiring Banksy’s artwork years before he got famous.
So I’m biting the hand that feeds me and I’m turning my back on my friends
I’m just bitter and angry because they won’t let me in.
I’ve asked everyone and I got no reply.
Everyone just keeps on saying this year it’s really tight.
I don’t know why I can’t get a gig at Glastonbury this year.
But it breaks my heart to tell you, you won’t find me there.
The first time I went to Pilton I was 16 years old, I hitchiked there all by myself and did the festival alone.
The experience changed my life and I never looked back
I’ve been to every one since and I feel the elastic band.
The first year I bought a ticket, the second I jumped a fence. The third I picked up litter and the fourth I painted bins.
The fifth year I played my first gig at the Banyan Tree Café
The sixth year I got in for free when they asked me to play.
So I’m biting the hand that feeds me and I’m turning my back on my friends
I’m just bitter and angry because they won’t let me in.
So thank you Billy Bragg and thank you Strummerville. Thank you Emily Eavis, and thank your old man as well.
I don’t know why I can’t get a gig at Glastonbury this year but it breaks my heart to tell you,
you won’t find me there.
Now I understand that singing this is sort of suicidal.
If anybody hears this, I won’t get booked next year either.
Glastonbury I love you from the bottom of my heart, I just wish that you wanted me to take part.
Coma Girl – Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros
When Bruce Springsteen opened his set at Glastonbury in 2009 he opened it with Coma Girl a relatively unknown Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros track that was written on the Glastonbury site itself.
Joe Strummer loved Glastonbury and is part of the festivals fabric. There is even an area named after him in Strummerville. He would play impromptu jam sessions around the fire sitting on battered sofas for hours on end. This was before Strummerville moved.
The pull of the festival was so strong for Joe that he moved way out west and even had a stone circle built in his garden by Ivan McBeth, the man who created Glastonbury’s Stone Circle.
Coma Girl Lyrics:
I was crawling through a festival way out west
I was thinking about love and the acid test
But first I got real dizzy with a real rocking gang
And then I saw the Coma Girl and the excitement gang
And the rain came in from the wide blue yonder
Through all the stages I wandered
Oh, Coma Girl and the excitement gang
Mona Lisa on a motorcycle gang
Coma Girl
Coma Girl
Coma Girl was beating with the oil drum gang
Some fast food fanatic was burning down a burger van
Somebody was wailing off their head, oh
Nobody was ripping the teen scene dead
And the rain came in from the wide blue yonder
I thought you and me might wander
Oh, Coma Girl and the excitement gang
Mona Lisa on a motorcycle gang
Coma Girl
Coma Girl on a motorcycle gang
As the nineteenth hour was falling upon Desolation Row
Some outlaw band had the last drop on the go
Let’s siphon up some gas, let’s get this show on the road
Said the Coma Girl to the excitement gang
Into action everybody sprang
The oil drums were beating out dulang, dulang
Coma Girl and the excitement gang
Oh, Mona Lisa on a motorcycle gang
Coma Girl (dulang, dulang)
Coma Girl (dulang, dulang)
Mona, baby
Mo-Mona, baby (dulang, dulang)
Mona, baby
Mo-Mona, baby (dulang, dulang)
Hey-ho, yeah-ho, let it roll
(Dulang, dulang)
(Dulang, dulang)
Glastonbury Song – The Waterboys
This song is about Glastonbury Town not the festival but it is included because without the town there would be no festival.
Glastonbury Town is one of the most unique places in England and has been attracting pilgrims for years. We all make our own pilgrimages each year down to Worthy Farm.
The Waterboys are Glasto regulars. They have played the festival at least 15 times. If anybody knows this area of Somerset it is them.
Glastonbury Song Lyrics:
I dreamed myself from the sultry plains
To the old green square back in old Maybole
Rode the wind up to Stornaway
Paused at the peak, pacified my soul
Caught the bus in the fairy fort
Made it to the mansion on the Boyne
See, I come around to the ancient ways
I took a tip from the Buddha boy
I just found god (I just found god)
Yeah, I just found god (I just found god)
Yeah, I just found god where he always was
We came down from the hill of dreams
Bernadette, mother earth, and you and me
Through Carraroe, down the Wildwood side
Blinding our eyes in the shallow seas
Drank fire with the King of the Blues
Plugged in to the medicine way
Took a long last look at Crazy Horse
Push now for a golden age
I just found god (I just found god)
Yeah, I just found god (I just found god)
Yeah, I just found god where he always was
Found myself on the roof of the world
Just waiting for to get my wings
Strange angel in the changing light
Said, “Brother, you forgot something”
My heart beat from the inside out
So lucky just to be alive
Can you tell what I’m talking about?
Any day now the sun’s gonna rise
I just found god (I just found god)
Yeah, I just found god (I just found god)
Yeah, I just found god where he always was
Hey, you just found god where he always was
There is a green hill far away
I’m going back there one fine day
There is a green hill far away
I’m going back there one fine day
There is a green hill far away
I’m going back there one fine day
There is a green hill far away
I’m going back there one fine day
One fine day
One fine day
One fine day
Sat In A Field – The Leylines
This song captures English summer perfectly. The Leylines has to be the best band name for anyone who has played Glastonbury. The band are from Weston Super Mare in Somerset so they are locals.
Sat In A Field’s lyrics capture the freedom of summer at Glasto perfectly. “The mid morning sun brings a golden glow, there is only one thing, one place to go. The Somerset Fields in a town for the ultimate show. And now were sat in a field drinking cider in the sun, sat in a field having festival fun. All we need now is music and our friends.”
I suggest playing this on a dark cold winter night. The thought of being back at Glastonbury doing the above will warm you up.
Ivy – Gracie Petrie
I love this song. I am going to let the lyrics speak for themselves.
It was Glastonbury twenty fourteen
And me and my best friend
We’d had an awesome festival
And then we got a call on Sunday about half past ten
And it was back to the camp
And it was pack up the tent
And it was saying goodbye to Billy Bragg as we went
And telling our friends that we had somewhere to be
Someone so much more important than all those VIPs
It was your mum on the phone that rerouted us
We got a hug goodbye from Phil Jupitus
And then we drove all night from Glastonbury to meet you home
When you were ready to arrive, Ivy
And I drove until the sun came up to beat you home
All the way up the M5, Ivy
And being early for someone was a first for me
But I thought my heart would burst if you got there before me
And all the way home all I thought was
How I can’t wait to tell you this story, Ivy
Thanks for waiting for me
And I can’t wait to know the person you’ll become
And I can’t wait to hear what music that you like
And I can’t wait to know the future as you’ll see it
And I wonder if I’ll still be behind the mic
And Ivy maybe one day when you’re my age
Well maybe I’ll be singing from that pyramid stage
That once I drove all night from Glastonbury to meet you home
When you were ready to arrive, Ivy
How I drove until the sun came up to beat you home
All the way up the M5, Ivy
And being early for someone was a first for me
But I thought my heart would burst if you got there before me
And all the way home all I thought was
How I can’t wait to tell you this story, Ivy
Thanks for waiting for me
Thanks for waiting for me to arrive
And let me just say thanks for not bringing labour on
Until Sunday night and halfway through Kasabian
Because who the fuck cares about Kasabian?
And thanks for not coming during Dolly Parton
Oh, believe me, Iv’, when I say I would have driven
Right up the M5 to be there when you start living
But I must admit that I would be sad departing
‘Cause how many times in life do you get to see Dolly Parton live?
Not that many, Iv’
But I drove all night from Glastonbury to meet you home
When you were ready to arrive, Ivy
And I drove until the sun came up to beat you home
All the way up the M5, Ivy
And being early for someone was a first for me
But I thought my heart would burst if you got there before me
And all the way home all I thought was
How I can’t wait to tell you this story, Ivy
No, I can’t wait to tell you this story, Ivy
Yeah and one day I’ll tell you this story, Ivy
Thanks for waiting for me.
Glastonbury Girl – The Rolling Stones
The Stones at Glastonbury. One of those ” I was there moments”. As you can see in the clip, Mick talks about wandering around the festival and meeting people. He got inspired to write this little blues ditty in the morning before their headline set.
I can’t think of any other festival that would inspire legends like The Rolling Stones to write a special song just for the occasion.
Glastonbury Revisited – Cosmic Rough Riders
This song sounds like a throwback to the early Glastonbury Festivals. Even though the festival has evolved from those early hedonistic days there are still pockets of it if you know where to look.
I love how the weather plays such a part in a lot of these songs. Not that the weather will stop us from having a good time.
Glastonbury Revisited Lyrics:
Glastonbury evening sun
From where have all the angels come
We could hear an angel’s choir
As we sang ’round an evening fire
A yellow moon lit up the sky
And left me happy enough to cry
Glastonbury we got high
As Heaven’s rain clouds passed us by
Where have all the angels gone
Now that all the acid’s done?
We made love under the sun
We’re back to nature on the farm
We were higher than the sky
As Heaven’s rain clouds passed us by
We could hear an angels choir
I swear, we couldn’t get no higher
Where have all the angels gone
Now that all the acid’s done?
It’s raining love on, everyone
Who knows where we will go
At the end of this rainbow
Glastonbury’s golden sun
Will shine its love on everyone
Where have all the angels gone
Now that all the acid’s done?
We made love under the sun
We made love under the sun
We made love under the sun
We made love under the sun
We made love under the sun
We made love under the sun
We made love under the sun
We made love under the sun
We made love under the sun
Glastonbury Weekend – Beans On Toast
We started with him and it feels right that we end with him. Beans On Toast captures lockdown and Glastonbury in this lovely song. At one point we all must have thought would we ever have a Glastonbury Weekend again. Thankfully the Glasto Gods made sure that we did.
Glastonbury Weekend lyrics:
A Zoom quiz with the family
A FaceTime dinner party
Working from home or working out with Joe Wicks
Thank god for the Internet
Because whoever your chosen god is
They’ll be performing their sacred service
In your living room on your phone
You no longer have to leave your home
For the sunrise over Stonehenge on summer solstice
Cooking lessons or yoga classes
Homeschooling with Hey Dougie or a university lecturer
Now your big business meeting is held on a computer
And all gigs are now livestream shows
Bruce Springsteen from his New Jersey home
Billy Bragg live on his settee
Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s great but it isn’t Glastonbury
And by all accounts, the world is probably ending
We’ve got bigger fish to fry and more important matters need attending
But that don’t mean that I don’t miss my friends
As I wonder to myself, ‘What are we gonna do Glastonbury weekend?’
Dropped a couple pingers and logged onto HouseParty
Tuned into Erol Alkan
Rinse out in the living room
And for a minute there I forgot that I was all alone
Or that I had a date with Taylor Swift
And Paul McCartney on the pyramid
I know there will be reruns on the BBC
And that’s all well and good but that’s not my Glastonbury
And by all accounts, the world is probably ending
We’ve got bigger fish to fry; more important matters need attending
But that don’t mean that I don’t miss my friends
As I wonder to myself, ‘What are we gonna do Glastonbury weekend?’
And if the sun shines down over Pennard Hill
And there’s no one there to witness it, does it even shine at all?
And all of the music and the madness and the magic
And the millions of memories that can’t be replicated
And I know it’s just one year, it shouldn’t be a big deal
But lately I’ve been really fucking scared about the world
And I need something to restore my faith in humanity
I need Glastonbury
And so I’ll ask you again
What are we gonna do Glastonbury weekend?
To listen to most of these tracks and loads of others who have played Glastonbury over the years head to my Ultimate Glastonbury Playlist on Spotify.
If you can think of more songs about Glastonbury, let me know in the comments and I will include them.
See you on the farm.
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