Hip-hop 'wrong' for Glastonbury

By Colin Paterson
Entertainment reporter, BBC News

Oasis headlined the main stage at Glastonbury in 1995 and 2004

Noel Gallagher has criticised the decision to have a hip-hop act headlining the Glastonbury Festival.

The Oasis guitarist said having rapper Jay-Z at the festival was the reason tickets had not sold out this year.

He said it was "wrong" to have a hip-hop headliner and added that organisers had changed things too much.

But Hattie Collins, editor of urban music magazine RWD, called Gallagher's comments "ill-informed rubbish" and said Jay-Z was a "great crowd puller".

There were 100,000 tickets sold for Glastonbury on the first day, but in past years all tickets had sold out in a matter of hours.

Gallagher said: "If it ain't broke don't fix it.

"If you start to break it then people aren't going to go. I'm sorry, but Jay-Z? No chance.

"Glastonbury has a tradition of guitar music and even when they throw the odd curve ball in on a Sunday night you go 'Kylie Minogue?'

"I don't know about it. But I'm not having hip-hop at Glastonbury. It's wrong."

Oasis headlined the Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury in 1995 and 2004, with the event selling out on both occasions.

Kanya King, who established the Mobo Awards, said Gallagher was wrong to criticise the festival's choice of headliner.

Gone are the days when a guy would turn up with a microphone and grab himself while wandering around mumbling Hattie Collins, editor of RWD magazine

"Given that Glastonbury is trying to reach a younger audience and diversify then I think it's important that they embrace hip-hop," she said.

"It seems only fitting that you should have a global superstar act like Jay-Z on the show.

"Glastonbury doesn't have that many hip-hop acts on the main stage, so maybe music lovers will get to see him and their opinions will change."

Ms Collins said she believed the Oasis songwriter had "probably never seen Jay-Z live or heard any of his tunes".

"Hip-hop in a live setting can be fantastic and has just as much right to be there as any other run-of-the-mill indie band," she added.

Jay-Z will headline Glastonbury's Pyramid Stage on the Saturday night

"Gone are the days when a guy would turn up with a microphone and grab himself while wandering around mumbling."

Glastonbury organisers took out an advert in Monday's Guardian newspaper to encourage ticket sales.

The ad invites people to "take a five-day break at Worthy Farm and enjoy the most extraordinary festival anywhere in the world".

The full line-up will be announced on 1 May.

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Gallagher also rubbished recent stories saying Oasis were ready to "do a Prince" and have a residency at London's O2 Arena.

"We'll never play the O2," he said. "We went there to see Led Zeppelin and to be honest the gig was fantastic, but it was the most soul destroying venue I've ever been to.

"And much to our manager and agent's disappointment, we came back and said we would never play there.

"So it means we are going to have to do 640 nights at Earl's Court, I would have thought.

"It's too Americanised for me, and it's too far away. Any gig you can get to by boat that hasn't got a beach is wrong."

He did confirm that Oasis' seventh studio album had been completed.

"That's finished. All done. We're just kind of waiting to get a record deal and get it out.

"We've not managed to get a title yet. We're in the middle of doing the artwork. Down to a shortlist of about three."