Culture | Music SZA provided the soundtrack to the final sunset of Glastonbury 2024 yesterday evening at the Pyramid stage. Performing to a significantly smaller crowd than the two previous headliners ( Dua Lipa and Coldplay ), many festival-goers packed up and left soon after Shania Twain’s legends slot mid-afternoon. Emerging from the heavens on a podium to the gentle lull of PSA, the 34-year-old New Jersey singer’s syrupy tone was immediately recognisable.
The stage itself looked something akin to an Eighties sci-fi film — the mouth of a cave, complete with giant insects and echoing water droplets. Making up for reduced crowd numbers in the back, fans up front sang twice as loudly, sacrificing the very last of their voices for tracks Love Galore and Broken Clocks. The first big cheer of the evening was in reaction to All The Stars, and again with F2F, as fans chanted the lyrics ‘F*ck ‘em ‘cause I miss you’.
SZA’s Glastonbury headline slot follows two huge years for the singer, releasing her platinum-selling, Grammy-winning album SOS in 2022, and touring it in the years since . As well as being the person responsible for one of the biggest R&B records of recent years, it’s easy to see how the star became a global sensation. With a slew of backing dancers and polished choreography from the jump — paired with faultless, unwavering vocals — no one could dispute that she didn’t give her all.
One thing she didn’t give us was a chat, with disappointingly.
