Blur’s Alex James Downplays Glastonbury Hype In New Comments

Alex James has shared his thoughts on Glastonbury Festival, describing the iconic event as “a gory drugs bender” and claiming that the level of attention it receives makes it seem like “the only festival in the world”.

The Blur bassist, who also runs his own event called Big Feastival, made the comments during a recent interview with The Times while discussing major music festivals across Europe.

During the conversation, James explained that although Glastonbury remains hugely popular, he believes there are far better festivals happening elsewhere across the continent that do not receive the same recognition as the long running Worthy Farm event, which stretches across between 900 and 1,500 acres.

“You’d think it’s the only festival in the world,” he said, before comparing it to what he described as “a gory drugs bender” when placed alongside festivals such as Roskilde Festival, which he believes deserves more appreciation.

“Roskilde’s got amazing food because it’s Denmark, it’s just really civilised and the toilets are nice. It’s a wonderful, magical, Hans Christian Andersen fairytale of an event,” he added.

Blur have appeared at Glastonbury Festival several times over the years, first performing on the NME Stage in 1992 before later headlining the festival in both 1998 and 2009.

Glastonbury 2025. Credit: Andy Ford for NME

The band released their comeback album ‘The Ballad Of Darren’ in 2023, marking their first studio record in eight years. The following year, frontman Damon Albarn made headlines during the band’s performance at Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival after becoming frustrated with the audience’s lack of energy.

Although the set included major hits such as ‘Song 2’ and ‘Popscene’, Albarn appeared irritated during a singalong attempt for the 1994 anthem ‘Girls & Boys’.

“You can do it better than that,” he told the crowd while encouraging fans to sing along. After receiving a muted response, he added: “You’re never seeing us again, so you might as well fucking sing it. Know what I’m saying?”

Earlier this year, James, who has also built a successful career as a cheesemaker and winemaker, spoke with NME about taking his orchestral ‘Britpop Classical’ show on tour after debuting it at his Big Feastival event.

He also revisited the controversy surrounding Blur’s 2024 Coachella appearance and admitted he was impressed by the scale of the California festival.

“Coachella is the biggest festival in the world. As someone who runs a festival, I was impressed by that. I thought it was great,” he said.

James first launched Big Feastival alongside Jamie Oliver in 2011, originally hosting it on Clapham Common in London before permanently relocating the event to his farm in Kingham, Oxfordshire in 2012. This year’s edition is set to feature headline performances from Basement Jaxx, The Streets and Bastille.