麻豆官网首页入口

Floods, mud, drugs and gentrification - the 麻豆官网首页入口 reports literally from the field

Glastonbury has seldom been out of the news this year; the , the , poor old Dave Grohl and cancelling the Foo Fighters headline slot, then to climb one place further up the bill - and that was all before the festival even started. In years gone by, everything seemed simpler, but there was always something to talk about. Here are a few 麻豆官网首页入口 News reports stretching all the way back to the very early days of Glastonbury...

Anyone who grew up in the 70s or 80s will know from Newsround. Here he is back in 1971 at the second Glastonbury working out whether drugs are a problem at the festival. "Really, it's only natural that when you get together 8,000 people who don't really believe in the established way, some of them will get high on drugs," he says. But neither Craven, nor the local police or Red Cross, think there's much of a problem. If anything, they seem more concerned about "girls with retention illness caused simply because they didn't want to use the lavatories on the site".

"This is the first year the festival has officially had a political motive, and that motive is disarmament," begins this 1981 report, before Catholic priest Bruce Kent, Secretary General of CND (Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament) says that support for protest group is "out of control, administratively". Meanwhile, Michael Eavis bats off accusations that the villagers are getting restless about the festival taking place in Glastonbury (right).

Having an indie pop act, , headline in 1984 caused a Kanye-sized hoo-hah, but the booking wasn’t nearly as revolutionary as signing up Afrobeat originator and his 20-piece band to also play at the festival. In this 麻豆官网首页入口 News report, he’s called “one of the most popular controversial musicians to come out of Africa”, who has been “an outspoken critic of successive Nigerian governments - civilian and military”.

Hippies on the 9 O’Clock News! And all because they arrived at Worthy Farm too early. For insurance reasons, Michael Eavis needs them gone, as reports: “The farmer who is holding a pop festival near Glastonbury next week won a high court injunction against nearly 100 hippies camped on his land." But good old Eavis lets them stay till the next morning.

In John Craven’s 1971 report, the police simply keep an eye on drug use at Glastonbury. In 1987, they pounced, arresting 90 festival-goers. “Police say they seized a variety of drugs including cocaine and LSD,” Philip Hayton reports.

In other, less dramatic news, the local bobbies “have had to tow away cars to prevent traffic chaos”.

You know how everyone goes on about how middle-class Glastonbury has become in recent years? Here’s a report on the festival turning posh - in 1994. Brilliantly, an on-site newspaper vendor is interviewed. “The Guardian and the Independent are our biggest sellers - the heavy papers are a lot more popular now,” he says, providing concrete proof that the toffs have taken over the farm.

Then, also in 1994, an unimaginable disaster: the Pyramid Stage burns down (right).

"The site's underwater after being battered with heavy rain," starts this Newsbeat report in 2005 - one of the worst years ever for weather. Even the Pyramid Stage was "down, because of fears bands would be struck by lightning. Entertainment reporter Kev Geoghegan says, "I've seen people’s tents literally floating down the road," by the punters remain defiant, refusing to go home.

It seems almost unimaginable today, but in 2008 Glastonbury didn't sell out. On the day the festival opens, Jon Kay speaks to Michael Eavis, who says he's lost weight worrying about poor sales. Ask what he thinks is to blame he says, "Three years of mud probably, don't you think? Wouldn't it put you off?" But Kay thinks perhaps headliner is the reason people have not flocked to Worthy Farm.

In the event, the rain held off and Jay Z blew the point off the Pyramid Stage with his Noel Gallagher-mocking rendition of Wonderwall.

Ticket sales have remained more than bouyant ever since.