The Glastonbury Festival, which sold out next year's event in a record time of one hour and 40 minutes, yesterday underlined what a cash cow it is.

i Newspaper
 
TheIPaper
The Independent around the web
E-break Time
Independent Crossword
Revellers at last year's Glastonbury Festival

Festival fans take a swipe at the 'Big Brother' wristband

Privacy fears over microchip that would replace tickets – and cash

Feeling mud: Have festivals like Glastonbury lost their allure?

Are our field days over?

Interest in the Big Chill has cooled, Glastonbury is too now commercial... Summer festivals need to get creative andreinvent themselves if they hope to survive, says Lena Corner

Feeling mud: Have festivals like Glastonbury lost their allure?

Music festivals: are our field days over?

Interest in The Big Chill has cooled, Glastonbury is too commercial... Summer music festivals need to get creative and reinvent themselves to survive

A hard day's ride

Cycling from Land's End to John O'Groats was a tough gig for Warren Howard and his band, and that's before they sang for their supper – and charity – every night as well

Eavis calls for ban on Chinese lanterns at Glastonbury

Glastonbury Festival organiser Michael Eavis has called for Chinese lanterns to be banned nationwide. Revellers smuggle them into the festival site and send the paper, wire and lit wax candle lanterns into the sky.

The good life – the future of rock'n'roll

Touring was supposed to be the music industry's financial saviour, but now even gigs are losing their allure. So can packing fans on to a cruise liner pay dividends? Gillian Orr finds out

Michael Eavis predicts end to Glastonbury

Glastonbury festival organiser Michael Eavis thinks the event could end in "three or four years".

Glastonbury: Coldplay and U2 almost spoil the party

The headliners split the crowds, but this year's Glastonbury showed that the Seventies dream lives on at Worthy Farm

'Power list' highlights our golden oldies

A "gold age power list" of the country's most influential pensioners has been published. The list – which includes The Queen, 85, Sir Alex Ferguson, 70, and Sir Mick Jagger, 67 – aims to challenge stereotypes and misconceptions about older people. It was compiled by the charity WRVS, which said the UK's ageing population was too often seen as a "looming disaster" and a "drain on society".

Cameron 'devastated' at death of aide

David Cameron said that a "big rock in my life has suddenly been rolled away" after a senior Conservative was found dead at the Glastonbury Festival.

Diary: Cameron bonds with Bear

Bear Grylls and Dave Cameron, fellow Old Etonians – and, like myself, thriving survivors of Boarding School Syndrome – were recently introduced, Grylls tells me at a screening of his new Discovery Channel series Born Survivor. "He was cool, actually," said Grylls with an admirably straight face. "He's got a real presence about him. Politics aside, I thought he was great. Actually not even politics aside: I think his politics are great!"

Glastonbury set for muddy return

Muddy mayhem could make an unwelcome return at Glastonbury Festival this week, forecasters warned today.

Glastonbury bingo! Celebrate the best music festival of all

Can't make it to the Vale of Avalon shindig this year? Never mind! As you slumber in front of the TV, how many of our 50 key predictions can you tick off?

Wombles a mistake, says Glastonbury boss Michael Eavis

Glastonbury Festival boss Michael Eavis is lamenting the booking of novelty group The Wombles for this year's event - and said it was a mistake.

Career Services

Day In a Page

Independent Travel Shop See all offers »
Imperial Cities of Morocco
Seven nights half-board from only £799pp Find out more
Historic Sicily
Seven nights half-board from £799pp Find out more
4* all-inclusive Crete
Seven nights from only £399pp Find out more
Budapest city break
Three nights from only £229pp Find out more
Andrew Mitchell: 'It's no good feeling hard done by'

Andrew Mitchell: 'It's no good feeling hard done by'

In his first interview since 'plebgate', the former Chief Whip opens up just enough to concede that, in politics, you have to take the rough with the smooth
Corruption and the FCO: Blue skies, white sands, dark clouds

Corruption and the FCO: Blue skies, white sands, dark clouds

Special report: Met police call for criminal inquiry into former diplomat's Cayman Islands rule
Fallen angel: Winona Ryder on bouncing back from her decade in the wilderness

Fallen angel: Winona Ryder bounces back

She owned the 1990s... but then she disappeared. Now, Ms Ryder is back with quite the bang in her latest role, as the wife of a notorious real-life Mob hitman.
Roman Polanski shakes Cannes Film Festival

Roman Polanski shakes Cannes Film Festival

The director's new film, 'Venus in Fur', is one of the raciest on offer
Rev Richard Coles: 'I don’t have any concerns that God is cross with me for being gay and eventually the Church won’t either'

Rev Richard Coles on the Church and homosexuality

The mellifluous, erudite and witty Coles is the nation's most pop-culture-friendly priest
'Baghdad likes to live from crisis to crisis': Civil war looms in Iraq

Patrick Cockburn: Civil war looms in Iraq

The governor of Kirkuk - one of the country's most violent but successful provinces - fears the worst
Written on the body: Tattooists at pains to point out their artistic credentials

Written on the body

Tattooists at pains to point out their artistic credentials
Conquering Everest: 60 facts about the world's tallest mountain

Conquering Everest: 60 facts about the world's tallest mountain

The IoS marks the sixtieth anniversary of Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay first reaching the peak of the highest mountain on Earth
A new, and irreversible, Dust Bowl looms

Rupert Cornwell: A new, and irreversible, Dust Bowl looms

The destructive power of tornadoes will be as nothing once the Great Plains' vast underground water reserve dries up
Every creature's needless death diminshes us all

Philip Hoare: Every creature's needless death diminishes us all

A 60 per cent decline in our national species should alarm us, yet few of us act. But to mind more about animals would reflect well on society
Killing with kindness: Burma's religious battleground - and the monks at the heart of it

Killing with kindness: Burma's religious battleground

Six years ago, the world cheered the monks behind Burma’s Saffron Revolution. Now, a horrific new eruption of religious slaughter is being blamed on a 'Buddhist Bin Laden'.
Let's take it outside: Bill Granger's Bank Holiday feast

Let's take it outside: Bill Granger's Bank Holiday feast

You can’t always depend on the weather – but you can avoid the pitfalls of the British barbecue by preparing an elaborate outdoor feast indoors ahead of time...
The Calvin report: Stirring Champions League final shows how far English game must advance

The Calvin report

Stirring Champions League final shows how far English game must advance
10 big questions for the British & Irish Lions to answer

10 big questions for the British & Irish Lions to answer

Warren Gatland's squad fly Down Under aiming to do justice to the expectations – and hoping the Wallabies stay in the pub
The Last Word: Golf must end the hypocrisy before its halo slips totally

The Last Word

Golf must end the hypocrisy before its halo slips totally