UPDATE: Neil Young apparently changed his mind. BBC says his Glastonbury set will stream after all.
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The Neil Young/Glastonbury tug of war has been quite the ordeal. On New Year's Day, long before the venerable UK music festival released its 2025 lineup, Young announced he was dropping out of this year's fest due to its partnership with the BBC, which was a "corporate turn-off." Two days later, he said he would still play Glasto after all, citing "an error in the information received." The festival is finally happening this weekend, with Young and his new band the Chrome Hearts topping the bill Saturday, sandwiched between headline sets from his younger peers the 1975 (Friday) and Olivia Rodrigo (Sunday). If you were looking forward to livestreaming it, you're out of luck.
Young has opted out of livestreaming his set at the Pyramid stage Saturday night. The Telegraph shared this statement from the BBC:
On Saturday on BBC iPlayer, our Glastonbury Channel and five streams for the main stages will bring a range of live performances to audiences.
At the artist’s request, we won’t be livestreaming Neil Young’s set. Our plans, including those for our TV highlights shows and on-demand coverage, continue to be finalised right up to and during the festival.
Instead, viewers of the BBC livestream will see Charli XCX's performance at the Other Stage during Young's set. Having recently witnessed Charli in action, this is not such a bad alternative.
This isn't the first time Young has expressed reservations about the BBC's coverage of Glastonbury. In 2009, when he last headlined the fest, he wanted to restrict the network's ability to air his performance in order to preserve the "mystery" around it. The BBC ended up airing five songs from his performance on television and online.
