Olivia Rodrigo, Turnstile & More

There are very few rushes like seeing a rising band smash their biggest show to date. Having won the Glastonbury Emerging Talent competition last month, Manchester’s Westside Cowboy blasted the Woodsies tent with charisma as they opened the stage on Sunday morning. Their ramshackle but highly melodic indie was the perfect pick-me-up for any potential sore heads in the crowd, kicking off the festival’s final day in sublime style.

You might think you don’t know Cymande, but you do. The London funk band’s material has been sampled by hip-hop royalty for decades (De La Soul, The Fugees, Wu-Tang Clan) since it was first released in the 1970s. Now the band are back for a new album, Renascence, their first in over a decade and one of their finest since their golden era: Cymande, 1972; Second Time Round, 1973; Promised Heights, 1974. Their West Holts set on a lazy Sunday afternoon was a perfect reintroduction to a new generation of fans, with “Bra” and “Brothers on the Slide” sounding timeless.

There are surely few things more awe-inspiring than watching an artist experience their first-ever Glastonbury moment. Up on Woodsies, Djo — the moniker of Stranger Things‘ Joe Keery — prompted the crowd to break into a spontaneous, yet unified two-step for “Basic Being Basic,” the standout track from scintillating second LP The Crux. Throughout, he hopped around for many a celebratory jump, letting out the occasional yell of “Glastonburyyyyyyy” — a display that was totally endearing and totally earned.

Baltimore’s Turnstile are undeniably the band of the summer. Their new album Never Enough scaled the Billboard 200, and they recently released an accompanying visual film. The memo has reached Somerset, with a healthy contingent of their Other Stage crowd decked out in Turnstile merch for the sweatiest, hardest rocking show of the festival. Mosh pits formed early and never stopped spinning, bouncing and surfing. Nifty camera work showcasing the crowd on the big screens brought the whole field together.

St. Vincent knows what it means to be a Glastonbury veteran. The seminal alt-rocker last graced these shores in 2022 for a sunset slot on the Other Stage; she returned on Sunday for a late-afternoon billing over on Woodsies, where she made light of a crowd whom were — seemingly — still fighting off a hangover or two. “I’m not sure what trip you’re all on, but I want to be on it too,” she joked before launching into an electrifying “Sugarboy.” If electrolytes didn’t do the job to wake up any bleary punters here, this set — packed with highlights from her fiery LP All Born Screaming — certainly would have.

Wolf Alice do not need soft, pink-hued lights and a bubble machine to make clear that “Don’t Delete The Kisses” is a generational love song: that was evident within seconds of their swooning rendition of the track on the Other Stage this afternoon. Throughout the band’s equally emotive performances of “The Last Man on Earth” and forthcoming single “The Sofa,” too, vocalist/guitarist Ellie Rowsell’s voice fluttered and billowed like one of the flags streaming over the crowd before her. The sight of a group of young women in the front row singing — and truly feeling — every word made her lip tremble. Simply beautiful.

There are a number of coveted slots at Glastonbury, and the sunset slot is undoubtedly one of them — but particularly on the West Holts stage, a location perfect for discerning music fans with diverse and broad tastes. Aussie pop group Parcels landed the golden ticket on Sunday night and made hay while the sun shined for one last hour. The group fuses disco, pop and electronic music — see 2017’s Daft Punk-produced banger “Overnight” — but their live set has since developed into one of the most electrifying shows on the circuit. The memo clearly got around as this was one of the stage’s biggest, and grooviest, crowds of the whole weekend.

Given that Olivia Rodrigo is a bonafide Anglophile (“I love that you can drink a pint at noon here”), headlining Glastonbury was always going to be top of the bucket list, and she attacked the opportunity with ferocity. Her Pyramid headlining set was stacked with vulnerable sing-alongs (“Drivers License”), cutting clapbacks to a shitty ex (“Get Him Back!”) and Rodrigo’s endearing persona. Robert Smith of The Cure joined her for a special sing-along of “Friday, I’m In Love” and “Just Like Heaven” — a reminder about both the goth band’s endearing appeal, and Rodrigo’s regard within the music scene. A spectacular close to a brilliant weekend.