Dave Grohl posts an emotional open letter to the band’s US fans, as eagle-eyed UK fans were quick to spot a possible bulging Glasto hint
Rumours of Foo Fighters being set for a secret set at this year’s Glastonbury Festival have just strengthened further after the band published a ‘thank you’ letter which included somewhat of a peculiar word – but before we get to that, here’s a little recap;
When the full Glastonbury 2023 line-up including set times was released last month (Tuesday, 30th of May), among the known set times, the full breakdown also featured multiple TBA (To Be Announced) slots – leaving us guessing as to who may fill the coveted slits, with one of the main hot topics surrounding the extensive schedule being a slot occupied by an unknown act, who simply appears on the bill as ‘The Churnups‘.
The mysterious band – who have no online footprint when searching the internet and are presumably a high-profile secret act – are scheduled to perform on the Pyramid Stage on the opening day of music (Friday, 23rd June) for an hour and a quarter (6:15 PM – 7:30 PM) ahead of Royal Blood (8:15 PM – 9:15 PM) and headliners Arctic Monkeys (10:15 PM -11:45 PM).
Seeing that Jarvis Cocker and co are currently free over the Glasto weekend, the initial speculation by many fans online was that the pseudonym belongs to Pulp – who recently began their 2023 reunion tour and have been strongly rumoured for a possible performance at this year’s Glastonbury Festival for quite some time. However, since the widespread speculation began circulating, Pulp drummer Nick Banks has taken to social media to deny any link to the speculated slot, saying: “Though it’s very tempting to tease you lot again. I know nothing of the ‘Churnups’ band,” he tweeted. “Ok? Over and out. (For now).”
Here’s some clarifications
The Wednesday of which I speak is Sheffield Wednesday FC. League 1 play-off winners.
Though it’s very tempting to tease you lot again. I know nothing of the ‘Churnups’ band. Ok?
Over and out. (For now)
— Nick Banks (@therealnickbank) May 30, 2023
Desperately, trying to find any type of clues in Banks’ message, fans noticed that coincidently (or not?) ‘Over And Out’ is the title of a 2005 song by Foo Fighters, whose name has also been associated with The Churnups – as pointed out by an avid fan of the Festival on Twitter, and can be seen in a 2021 Seattle Times article (shown below), saying frontman Dave Grohl used to be in a band called ‘Churn’.
@foofighters you playing @glastonbury ? Come on say it’s you pic.twitter.com/cVr8ychtrB
— Crazyfool1 (@Crazyfool110) May 30, 2023
The plot thickens further after another eagle-eyed Twitter user pointed out that there appears to be a hawk in the new Glastonbury 2023 official artwork – with the connection being that Foo Fighters’ late drummer Taylor Hawkins had a hawk tattoo on his arm, as an ode to his surname, and recently a symbol used as a tribute to the musician by his fans and surviving bandmates.
Wait a minute… What’s this?! 🔎🤔💭#FooFighters #Glastonbury2023❓ https://t.co/V2P4u2Zt06 pic.twitter.com/TWzTC4Nv4r
— Glasto Fest Feed (@GlastoFestFeed) May 30, 2023
Now, as if that’s not enough, Foo Fighters have just poured even more fuel on the already strong rumouer-fire of speculations after including the sentence “churning up these emotions” in the new thank you note we mentioned above (and that can be seen below).
The new-look Foos, featuring new drummer Josh Freese, have been playing US shows in support of their newly-released album But Here We Are, with the positive feedback and support from the American rockers’ fans not going unnoticed by frontman Dave Grohl.
In a hand-written note, posted on the Foos’ social media channels this evening (Tuesday, 6th June), Grohl says: “Hey, it’s been a while, […] Now that we’ve returned from our first run of shows, I felt compelled to reach out and thank you all for being there for us.”
While adding: “Every night, when I see you singing, it makes me sing harder. When I see you screaming, it makes me scream louder. When I see your tears, it brings me to tears. And when I see your joy, it brings me joy. But, I see you… and it feels good to see you, churning up these emotions together.”
Foo Fighters have just poured a gallon of rumour-fuel on the already very strong speculations of them being the mysterious ‘Churnups’ band billed for this year’s #Glastonbury Festival – after including the sentence “churning up these emotions” in a new thank you letter… 🤔💌🔎🔥 https://t.co/LUoASerzAi pic.twitter.com/dq9EFMFkFb
— Glasto Fest Feed (@GlastoFestFeed) June 6, 2023
In conclusion and as a side note, it’s also worth noting that interestingly, 2023 marks 25 years since Foo Fighters first performed at Glastonbury Festival in 1998 – on the same day and in the same slot as The Churnups are billed.
All that said, of course, this is all hearsay and speculation at this moment in time, and we shall probably just have to wait and see how things turn out once everything gets revealed in due time by the Festival officials.
The Foos also headlined the Worthy Farm event in 2017, after being forced to cancel their appearance two years prior due to frontman Dave Grohl breaking his leg – he was then replaced by Florence and the Machine for the 2015 Festival.
The last time Grohl stepped foot at Worthy Farm was just last year, at Glastonbury 2022, after making a special guest appearance during Paul McCartney’s memorable headline show on the Pyramid Stage along with Bruce Springsteen – shown in the video below.
MORE LINE-UP NEWS
Along with the full line-up revelation, Glastonbury 2023, which this year will be held from the 21st to the 25th of June at its natural home in Worthy Farm, Pilton, has recently already confirmed a host of line-up posters for its individual areas and stages – including the bills for West Holts, Silver Hayes, Field of Avalon, Croissant Neuf, Left Field, Theatre & Circus Fields, The Common, Shangri-La, Woodsies, Arcadia, Unfairground, Glasto Latino, The Park, Kidzfield, Glade, Pilton Palais, Acoustic Stage, and Strummerville and most recently Block9.
Arctic Monkeys and Guns N’ Roses were officially announced as the two other headliners who will be taking to the Pyramid Stage on the Friday and Saturday nights of this year’s Festival (respectively). They joined Sunday night headliner Elton John who was the first headliner to be officially confirmed for Glastonbury 2023 line-up.
The first main Glastonbury 2023 line-up poster containing a taster of some of the big-name acts to perform at this year’s Festival was announced on Friday morning the 3rd of March at 9:32am – about half an hour after the initial Guardian article detailing the names on the line-up was published.
Some of the names featured on the main line-up poster include Lizzo, Lana Del Rey, Lil Nas X, Wizkid, and Yusuf / Cat Stevens – who will take to the iconic Pyramid Stage as this year’s Sunday teatime Legend Slot performer.
The first main line-up 2023 poster (mentioned above) was then updated to move 2 Other Stage headliners (Lana Del Rey and Wizkid), Sunday Pyramid sub (Lil Nas X) and Legend Slot performer (Cat Stevens / Yusef) to the second row, while later also omitting Slowthai from the line-up on the 17th of May – as shown in the poster below.
MAP NEWS & UPDATES
Glastonbury officials released the first public version of the Glastonbury 2023 map ahead of this year’s anticipated festival earlier this month (Thursday, 11th May), which features a number of changes and adjustments across the Worthy Farm site – which you can read all about here.
Some other key updates and changes that have been confirmed for this year’s Festival Include:
- Vodafone announcing a multi-year partnership with Glastonbury while replacing EE as the ‘Festival’s Official Connectivity Partner‘ – which up until 2022 was Glastonbury‘s technology partner for the seventh year running.
- Emily Eavis confirming the renaming of the John Peel Stage to Woodsies, as well as adding a new family-orientated area of the same name which will feature a campfire.
- Children not being allowed in the notorious after-hours south-east corner (also known as the ‘naughty corner’) after 10pm, while encouraged to seek out child-friendly areas across the site (such as the Theatre & Circus Fields, and the campfire in the new Woodsies area).
- The removal of the stage in William’s Green in order to make room for the return of Joe Rush’s Carhenge to the Festival grounds – 36 years after it first made its appearance at Glastonbury in 1987.
BUILD PROGRESS
Meanwhile, with each passing day, in preparation for this year’s highly anticipated event, Worthy Farm is getting to look more and more like the world-famous Glastonbury Festival we all know and love.
As of the time of writing, along with the Pyramid Stage, Other Stage, Long Drops and Fence, other build highlights include the construction of the West Holts Stage, the erection of the much-loved Ribbon Tower, the formation of the Co-op store, as well as placement of the first pillar of Joe Rushe’s new Carhenge.
With gates to the public on the 21st of June, and as more containers carrying equipment continue to arrive on-site intermittently, we can expect the build to grow in intensity as more iconic stages and venues come to life once again to create the largest greenfield music and performing arts festival in the world. You can now continue following the build via the BBC Glastonbury webcam, here.
TICKET OPPORTUNITIES
All tickets for this year’s Festival completely sold out when they originally went up for sale in November (last year).
Standard tickets for the 2023 Glastonbury Festival sold out in 61 minutes on the 6th of November [2022], after a swift sellout on the 3rd of November [2022] of tickets packaged with coach travel, which sold out in just 22 minutes.
There was then a resale of returned tickets packaged with coach travel last Thursday (20th April), which were all snapped up and sold out in just 10 minutes.
That was then followed by the resale of General Admission tickets which went up for grabs on Sunday morning (23rd April) and were all gone in just 6 minutes, after going on sale at 9am.
Although tickets have completely sold out, as you can see, there are plenty of other opportunities for getting to Glasto this summer – which include as well as entering competitions, also include working and volunteering at the Festival.
As of the time of writing, there is currently 1 open running competition for the chance of winning the golden ticket from Tony’s Chocolonely & Oxfam.
Read more about all the currently running competitions for the chance to win tickets to this year’s Glastonbury Festival in our updated list, here.
OTHER GLASTO NEWS
In other news, Glastonbury Festival in collaboration with Oxfam managed to raise more than £1 million for the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC)’s appeal to help communities impacted by the Turkey and Syria earthquakes.
The appeal, which came in the form of a raffle, gave participants the opportunity to win one of 10 pairs of tickets donated by the Festival to its sold-out 2023 event, each including a once-in-a-lifetime experience – such as the chance to watch a band from the side of the legendary Pyramid Stage or introduce an act on The Park Stage.
The appeal managed to raise more than £320,000 just 12 hours after launching on the 15th of February, rapidly increasing to £550,000 only 24 hours later and finally smashing its updated target of £1 million on Monday evening, the 6th of March.
The prize draw concluded at noon on the 8th of March raising a sum total of £1,044,130 from 46,390 supporters, with the draw set to take place on the 15th of March and winners notified by email and/or first-class post within 5 days of the draw date.
Prior to the Oxfam raffle mentioned above, the Festival also helped raise over £116,000 in aid of the Trussell Trust in a partnership auction to help support people facing hardship across the UK.
The money was put up in a series of 10 eBay auctions run by the food bank charity to raise funds for their network of over 1,300 food banks scattered across the country.
In this instance, similar to the Oxfam appeal, auctions offered 10 pairs of tickets which included once-in-a-lifetime opportunities for fans at the Festival.
The total from all ten Trussell Trust auctions amounted to £116,738 – with the “cheapest” pair of tickets selling for £10,200, which included the chance to watch a set from the Other Stage viewing platform.
DON’T BE FOOLED
Glastonbury Festival would very much like fans to be aware that there are people out there who will try and sell fake Glastonbury tickets to unsuspecting, willing and innocent potential purchasers.
Although Glasto-veterans who have been going to the Festival for quite some time may recognise these scams for what they are, newcomers might not.
Therefore, please remember that tickets are only sold on one site, which is: glastonbury.seetickets.com.
