From the moment Neil Young announced his Glastonbury headline set via the unusual approach of cancelling it on the grounds of the festival being under “corporate control” – backtracking shortly afterwards citing “an error in information”, it was clear that the legendary rocker was going to be doing things his way. His crowd is thinner on the ground than usual for a Saturday bill-topper, the victim of a gruesome clash with Charli XCX, Scissor Sisters and Doechii, but from the minute he strides onstage, he carries an understated magnetism that makes issues like broadcasting rights and audience size fade into nothing.
He steps onstage with no fanfare and no introduction, daubed in a trucker hat, a scruffy flannel shirt and a black tee bearing a small Canadian maple leaf, only his acoustic guitar in hand and harmonica around his neck. And yet, as soon as that famous, shaky voice – remarkably unchanged from – rings out atop the gentle acoustic strums of ‘Sugar Mountain’, it’s transfixing.
‘Be The Rain’ comes next, with his band The Chrome Hearts faultlessly tight as they unspool a raw wave of no-nonsense rock’n’roll. For the next two hours, the set alternates between these two modes – gorgeous acoustic quiet and rugged loud, neither a bell nor a whistle in sight. There are no visuals – just the words ‘LOVE EARTH’ behind the band, who stand in tight, insular formation in the middle of the stage.
The closest thing to the kind of special guest that’s become the norm for a Glastonbury headline is when Young informs us that he’ll be playing a guitar that once belonged to Hank Williams on the sprawling ‘Sun Green’. It’s one of very few addresses he makes to the crowd at all, beyond the occasional “how’s everybody doing out there?” and a brief nod to “you people watching on TV in your bedrooms” – which feels pointed, given all the to and fro over whether the BBC would be broadcasting his set at all.
It is, in short, the definition of no frills. It’s testament to the power of Young’s songwriting, then, just how brilliantly it all works, how little the momentum drops. There is a sequence bang in the middle, for instance, where a ‘Hey Hey, My My (Into The Black), beefed up to the point it borders on doom metal, is followed by the sparse beauty of ‘The Needle And The Damage Done’. When the gorgeous, melancholy drift of ‘Harvest Moon’ follows that, Young illuminated only by spotlight, there are audible gasps, some of audience visibly overcome.
It’s only during the set’s latter third that Young’s grip begins to loosen, ‘Love And Only Love’ and ‘Like A Hurricane’ drifting a little too far into endless jam territory, but a closing ‘Old Man’ reels everything straight back in with an exquisite inflection of lap steel guitar, Young’s voice sounding quite remarkably unchanged from the recording he made more than half a century ago. An encore of his most straight-up anthemic song, ‘Rockin’ In The Free World’, and a final, fiery rendition of ‘Throw Your Hatred Down’ ends it all in urgent fashion.
When Young had initially pulled out of the festival back in January, he said that one of his issues was that Glasto in its modern form is “not the way I remember it being”. Here, then, is a headline set that proves that sometimes, there’s still power to be found in an old-school approach.
Neil Young’s Glastonbury setlist was:
‘Sugar Mountain’
‘Be the Rain’
‘When You Dance, I Can Really Love’
‘Cinnamon Girl’
‘Fuckin’ Up’
‘Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)’
‘The Needle and the Damage Done’
‘Harvest Moon’
‘Looking Forward’
‘Sun Green’
‘Love and Only Love’
‘Like a Hurricane’
‘Name of Love’
‘Old Man’
Encore:
‘Rockin’ in the Free World’
‘Throw Your Hatred Down’
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