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Olivia Rodrigo at Glastonbury review – full of bile and brilliance, this is easily the weekend’s best big set


With a genuinely surprise appearance from the Cure’s Robert Smith and a magnificent theatricality to her lovelorn songs, Rodrigo totally steals the entire festival

But the singer is still capable of springing surprises, when she announces the arrival of a special guest – “perhaps the best songwriter to come out of England … a Glastonbury legend and a personal hero of mine”, you somehow automatically expect Ed Sheeran to appear from the wings, acoustic guitar in hand. It’s also a smart way of drawing in a crowd substantially more varied than you suspect ordinarily attends Rodrigo’s gigs: she made her name with songs that sounded like teenage diary entries set to music that balanced piano balladry with zippy pop-punk. has a timelessly snotty chorus that glam titans Chinn and Chapman would have been proud to give Suzi Quatro; All-American Bitch is sharp and funny; Vampire’s swell from downcast introspection to bile-spitting theatricality is brilliantly done – and that their tone is invariably lovelorn and accusatory.

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