The Cure’s Robert Smith has said it would be “counter productive” to play the band’s “slow and gloomy” new music during their headline set at Glastonbury.
The English rock band will headline the Pyramid stage on Sunday night but will stick to older material, the frontman has promised.
He told Steve Lamacq on BBC 6 Music: “We ran through some of the new songs but it’s really, really slow and gloomy, the new album, and we just did it in rehearsal on the first day and everyone was looking at each other and I knew what they were thinking but no-one wanted to say it.
“There is no way, it just wouldn’t fit.
The Cure @GlastoFest 2019 pic.twitter.com/sJ9nMVx96k
— The Cure (@thecure) March 21, 2019
“Later in the year we are going to be playing our own shows and we will be playing new album songs in that show.
“I honestly think it would be a very counter productive move to walk out on stage and play 10 minutes of slow dirge in front of a summer festival crowd.
“I don’t think anyone would appreciate it.”
The group first played at Glastonbury in 1986 and this will be their fourth headlining slot.
Smith said: “The biggest change in me over the last 20 years of performing is that 20 years ago I really didn’t care what the audience did or didn’t get into, it was entirely selfish.
“The performance was all about what I wanted to do and how the band was, whereas now I’m much more aware we are playing for people and I understand now that if they are into it, it makes the show even better.
“You get more into it, they get more into it. It’s a great feedback loop.
“The show is now a much more powerful show than certainly the last time we played Glastonbury, it’s a much better band.”