Sir Paul McCartney sought Brian May’s approval to play Glastonbury Festival – after the Queen star’s row with organiser Michael Eavis over the culling of badgers.
The Beatles legend headlines the Pyramid Stage at Worthy Farm in Pilton, Somerset, for the event’s 50th anniversary on Saturday, June 27.
Guitarist May, 72, said: “Paul was kind enough to phone me about this before he accepted the invitation.
He was concerned that he might be thought to be endorsing the current mass killing of badgers.”
He previously said Queen would never play the festival after a row with the Glastonbury organiser over the badger cull.
The fallout first began in 2013 as May is vehemently opposed to killing the animal while the festival boss was in favour of it for farming.
Eavis, 84 – who is also a dairy farmer – had described May as a “danger to farming.”
The cull is aimed at curbing bovine tuberculosis.
Farmer Eavis, who keeps 400 dairy cows and has a badger sett on his land, said he was “not inviting” gunmen to kill the badgers but he was in favour of the cull when there is “a heavy loss of cattle”, revealing a nearby farm had “lost 500 cows to TB”.
Macca, 77, will be returning to the festival for the first time since 2004.
Speaking about the booking, Eavis’ daughter Emily described him as “an absolute dream come true”.
Motown sensation Diana Ross, 75, is set to play the festival’s Sunday Legend’s slot on June 28.
