Notting Hill carnival will partner with Glastonbury festival for the first time this year, filling the site’s already colourful walkways with Caribbean floats and processions.
Until the Covid-19 pandemic, the carnival had been staged every year by west London’s Caribbean communities since the event coalesced in the mid-1960s – eventually becoming Europe’s largest annual street party. However, it has not been staged since 2019 after two carnivals were cancelled owing to Covid fears. Livestreamed events were held online in their place.
Glastonbury therefore marks the return of the carnival to in-person revelling, ahead of its full return in its usual home for the August bank holiday. Matthew Phillip, chief executive of Notting Hill Carnival Ltd, said the two events held “many of the same beliefs and represent the country on a global scale … it’s going to be great”.
Utilising an electric carnival float, there will be emissions-free parades through the festival site with a sound system playing Caribbean tracks, trailed by dancers, “mas bands” playing live music, and stilt-walking moko jumbies. After the processions, there will be concerts from the Mangrove Steelband, eight-time winners of the Panorama steel band championship held during the yearly carnival celebrations.
The latter concerts will take place in Block9, the sprawling multi-venue area in the east side of the festival site that hosts the bulk of Glastonbury’s late-night music and entertainment.
Block9 will also be marking the 30th anniversary of the Castlemorton rave held in the Malvern hills, Worcestershire, that became a focal point for authorities cracking down on unregulated outdoor parties. After a moral panic, the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act of 1994 was directly influenced by the rave, and criminalised gatherings of more than 20 people listening to music “wholly or predominantly characterised by the emission of a succession of repetitive beats”.
“We continue to fight for the utopian dream Castlemorton represented,” said Block9 co-founder Gideon Berger. “A dream of music, community, and progressive inclusivity free from state control and corporate profiteering.” The commemorative events, held at the festival’s Genosys stage, are also critical of 2022’s Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act, which allows police new powers to place noise restrictions on public protests.
Block9 has announced the rest of its nocturnal lineup, including house DJs Todd Edwards and Honey Dijon in the vibrantly queer-friendly nightclub NYC Downlow, and the return of outdoor area Iicon, featuring digital projections on a giant human head, described by organisers as “a pseudo-religious monument to the terrifying new realities emerging in our digital, post-truth age”. DJs and live performers include Shygirl, Overmono, Sherelle, Floorplan and Hercules & Love Affair.
Like the Notting Hill carnival, Glastonbury’s two most recent planned events were cancelled because of Covid-19, and like carnival, it held a livestreamed event in 2021. Plagued with technical difficulties, it hosted artists including Coldplay, Haim and Damon Albarn.
The festival, which begins on Wednesday 22 June, has carried over two of the headliners announced for 2020’s lineup to this year: Paul McCartney and Kendrick Lamar, who are joined by Billie Eilish. Diana Ross will perform in the crowdpleasing “teatime legend” Sunday slot.
