Q - How were your previous Glastonbury’s?

Matt: I’ve been four, five times as a punter and played twice. The first time was the best, Just getting in, that first sight of everything at night, was incredible. It was in 1995 and the weather was beautiful, but I honestly cant remember who was on. I do remember going up into the Green Fields with an acoustic guitar and playing Nirvana songs around a campfire. I love it up there – you can get your palm read, look into alternative energy, risk your mind. It was when I truly escaped from civilisation for the first time. In 1997 I got in by paying a farmer £10 to hide in his hay bales, ha!

Q - Is it still special?

Matt: Definitely. I’ve been to hundreds of festivals – in America, Australia, Japan, Russia – and to me Glastonbury is the best in the world, no contest. The diversity of it is incredible, it’s a real festival; at other festivals you just get a straight rock crowd who aren’t into being exposed to anything out of the ordinary. Here, that’s the whole point.

Q - What’s the recipe for a good festival?

Matt: Just make sure you’ve got the right bunch of mates with you. Ones who are open-minded and who’ll leave the moisturiser at home; you don’t want people who’ll waste time trying to stay groomed. And if the weather’s horrible and you have to go to the toilet on a newspaper in the tent, make sure they’re the kind of people who’ll be comfortable with it. And remember that you don’t need to see any bands. The trick is to go wandering and get lost and find beserk things – campfires where you can meet new gangs of best friends for two hours and then go again. I really like the cabaret and circus tents, they’re the best places to linger. That’s why festivals were born: to see a circus and some folk groups.

Q- Any down times?

Matt: By 1998, the mud had lost its novelty. I lost my shoes, the tent was full of crap, the toilets were overflowing – it all went a bit darkside. But even that was good fun, and it was great to see the Festival carrying on regardless. That’s the Glastonbury spirit isn’t it? It’s the English spirit, too. We like to take things on the chin.

Q - Does Glastonbury change how you play?

Matt: I dunno. When we play we want it to be a life-changing experience, so people feel that they’re getting something well out of the ordinary – that they’re seeing inside us. We’re trying to show things we wouldn’t show normally. So at Glastonbury, if the crowd’s with you and even the band don’t know where it’s going to go, maybe it does. Perhaps there is something that connects us with out caveman pasts. Our evolution has taken a long time, hasn’t it? Maybe we’re celebrating our previous selves.

Q - What’s happening next?

Matt: We’re supporting The Cure in America, touring Australia, going back to America… then we’re having a break. I don’t know if we’ll make another record. Maybe we’ll disappear.

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