PJ Harvey played surprise hometown gig ahead of Glastonbury 2024 set

2 July, 2024

PJ Harvey at Glastonbury 2024. Credit: Harry Durrant/Getty Images

It has been revealed that PJ Harvey played a secret surprise gig for her hometown ahead of her performance at Glastonbury 2024.

On Thursday (June 27), the musician surprised the residents of Bridport, Dorset – the town where she grew up near and is a resident in – to a show at the Abbotsbury Subtropical Gardens on the Jurassic Coast.

The gig served as a warm-up for her Glastonbury set and was kept under wraps with the exception of notices posted in Bridport town centre. The only way to purchase a ticket was by showing up in person and buying one from the Bridport Arts Centre or Bridport Tourist Information Centre.

The following day (June 28) Harvey took over the Pyramid Stage at the annual Worthy Farm music bash and opened her set by enlisting artist Marina Abramović to deliver a speech to the crowd before encouraging them to participate in a seven-minute silence.

The artist asked the crowd to put a hand on their neighbour and participate in the silence – which was brought in by Emily Eavis ringing a gong. Abramović then opened her arms to reveal a dress in the shape of a giant peace sign.

Writing about Harvey’s performance for NME‘s Glastonbury 2024 liveblog, journalist Jordan Bassett wrote: “The show started with an arty video that featured, as well as other outré images, a clip of a man pointing a bow and arrow at a woman who was complicit in the act – and things were about to get even artier. With the Pyramid Stage crowd expecting PJ Harvey to appear for her early evening set, conceptual and performance artist Marina Abramović instead arrived to lead a seven-minute silence, a moment of peace amid the ‘violence’ and ‘killing’ in the world.

He continued: “It was a truly moving occasion (not least due to the number of Palestinian flags clustered near the front of the crowd) and the sense of hushed reverence carried over to Harvey’s set. The ghostly keys on ‘Let England Shake’ and the experimental cacophony of ‘The Glorious Land’ seemed to take on a new delicacy in this context. Ever-mercurial, though, Harvey soon swerved into the grindhouse grunge of ‘50ft Queenie’ and the insidious squall of ‘Black Hearted Love’.

“If the set petered out a little after that with the understated ‘To Bring You My Love’, it was like a return to the eerie quietude from which it came. This was a meditative show in an era that’s often anything but.”

Earlier this summer, Harvey used her performance at Primavera Sound 2024 to pay tribute to the late record producer Steve Albini, who produced her second studio LP, 1993’s ‘Rid Of Me’.

While performing in Barcelona, she said: “I would like to sing this next song in memory of Steve Albini. Steve should have been here for this festival, and it would be nice if you all think of him.” Harvey then performed ‘The Desperate Kingdom Of Love’ from 2004’s ‘Uh Huh Her’.

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