My first music festival was the long-gone but fondly remembered V Festival, in Chelmsford, Essex. It was 1997 and I was 16, with some decent GCSEs in the bag and big life decisions ahead of me. That summer, though, all I wanted to do was see bands, friends and ditch home for a bit. Glastonbury felt too big for us callow youths, so we looked instead at Phoenix, Reading and T in the Park, before winding up at V because, I think, it was just up the A12, close to where we lived — and Blur were on.
The weather was bland, often drizzly. My fake ID worked once. One night we stayed up until dawn with the people in the tent next to ours, and somebody spun a bottle. I fell asleep on the train home and it was glorious, freeing, just the right side of hedonistic. I have been to a British music festival every year since.
But scouring the 2025 line-ups, I’m not sure I would bother this year — especially if I was 16 and looking for that first festival experience. Or even if I was 26. This is not, I hasten to add, because I think music was better in my day. Absolutely not: my favourite albums last year — Fontaines DC, English Teacher, MJ Lenderman — were made by artists in their twenties, while Charli XCX, who made the invigorating Brat, is only 32. Modern pop is vibrant — but a glance at this year’s festival posters shows a British summer season almost entirely soundtracked by Virgin Radio UK and Magic Radio, as if their organisers simply stopped listening to new music when they got a mortgage.
I’m not talking about Glastonbury: Worthy Farm’s extravaganza is an outlier, with something for everyone — but getting a ticket is harder than getting a headline slot. Nor do I mean End of the Road or Green Man, both excellent festivals for the 6 Music fan in your life. But take a look at the other big weekenders and you will see a line-up of artists who might have got the same gig back in, well, 1997.
Or even 1987. Every step you take, Sting is topping a bill. There he is, at Isle of Wight and Latitude, while others at those stalwart events include Stereophonics, Justin Timberlake, Fatboy Slim, Faithless, Texas and Snow Patrol. The rock behemoth Download boasts Green Day, Korn and Sex Pistols, who have a combined age of 4,473. Even the smaller three-day line-ups are going for experience over exuberance. In It Together festival is headlined by Kaiser Chiefs, while Truck is making people listen to Kasabian.
The line-up I saw at V was full of music relevant to kids that year: Blur in the year of Beetlebum, the Prodigy two months after The Fat of the Land came out, alongside imperial phase Chemical Brothers and Daft Punk. If you wanted to feel the pulse of the nation that summer you went to Chelmsford (or Leeds, V’s sister site that year).
Relevance now, though, is a foreign country. Sam Fender, 2025’s biggest pop star, is playing no British festivals, but six abroad. The Danish festival Roskilde has terrific headliners in Olivia Rodrigo, Fontaines DC and Stormzy. Sziget, meanwhile, on an island in Budapest, is the sound of a standard Gen Z bedroom, with ASAP Rocky, Chappell Roan and Post Malone on the bill. Then there is Primavera in Barcelona, a dream for under-40s with Charli XCX, Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Roan, FKA Twigs, Fontaines DC, Central Cee and Haim.
You will find some of these artists playing one-day mega-gigs in British cities, from London to Manchester to Glasgow — but we all know that the line-up is only half the appeal for a first-time festivalgoer. You fork out because you also want a mini-break from home, something city gigs don’t offer. And, rain or shine, camping is a rite of passage: I put up with mud in 1997 because I was 16 — but also there was no European or glamping alternative.
Now, though, British promoters risk ruining festival culture by focusing on punters old enough to remember the days when you didn’t use an app to find your tent. At this year’s Wilderness you can see Wet Leg, but the site also pushes spa treatments and expensive chefs — hardly in the budget or interest of teenagers. And so the next generation are opting for a weekend by the Med with line-ups they have actually heard of — and questioning why anyone would ever fork out £500 for three nights in the Midlands ever again.
Five European festivals to book now
NOs Alive
Get yourself to Lisbon for a line-up of some of 2025’s most heavily trending names: Benson Boone, Olivia Rodrigo and Sam Fender. Its motto is “beach by day, music by night”, which you don’t get in Glasgow. Jul 10-12
Bilbao BBK
This one takes place up Mount Cobetas, with views over Bilbao and a soundtrack of highly acclaimed bold young things including Raye, Amyl and the Sniffers, Michael Kiwanuka, Bicep and Japanese Breakfast. Jul 10-12
Primavera Sound
Barcelona is sold out — but the one in Porto, Portugal, is hardly a slouch, with Charli XCX, Fontaines DC, Jamie XX, Wet Leg and Haim. Jun 12-15
Open’er
Why not spend a weekend on an airfield in Poland, with stadium-fillers Linkin Park, plus the very top of the pops from Gracie Abrams to Doechii. Jul 2-5
We Love Green
Combining a trip to Paris with music is a win-win, and this Bois de Vincennes jamboree boasts Charli XCX, Ezra Collective, FKA Twigs and LCD Soundsystem. Jun 6-8
What festivals are you booking for this summer? Let us know in the comments below
