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The Rolling Stones at Glastonbury – Still Rocking after 50 years
As anyone who saw their performance at Glastonbury this weekend will attest, the Rolling Stones have still got it. We review their performance.
This Saturday night saw the Rolling Stones do something they had never done before. That’s saying quite a lot: with a combined age of 276 – and Keith Richards on guitar – there’s not much they haven’t seen. But never before had they played at Glastonbury festival. The annual music-and-mud-a-thon welcomed the Rolling Stones as heroes onto the famous pyramid stage. There, with Mick Jagger characteristically stalking back and forth like a peacock on Viagra, they performed a two-and-a-half hour set to over 100,000 people. Classics like ‘Satisfaction’ and ‘Jumping Jack Flash’ had the crowd sobbing with emotion.
Perhaps among those wiping away tears was Michael Eavis, the festival’s organiser, who had long cherished the dream of having the Rolling Stones headline. According to rumour, he first asked them 43 years ago, at the original Glastonbury festival – and it’s taken nearly half a century for Mick, Keith, Charlie and Ronnie to make the long journey to Somerset.
What makes them so extraordinary is their energy – and the inter-band relationships. We all know that Mick and Keith fell out a few years ago after Keith dared to mock the most famous penis in rock and roll. But when they’re together, playing the music that has made them superstars around the world, you can still see the lifelong love that they have for each other. It’s touching to think that these two lads have spent their lives in a teenage pursuit of fame and glory: and that they have won so spectacularly. And in the end, that is what makes them great. There’s a real story behind the band, peopled with eccentric characters and mad-cap stories. In a world of manufactured plastic-pop, the Rolling Stones are keeping it real. And only by being so grounded have they found their place among the stars.
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