S Poddar
Dua Lipa’s first headline performance at Glastonbury was nothing short of a spectacle. The pop star took the Pyramid Stage by storm, delivering a powerful and dynamic show that kept the audience enthralled from start to finish.
Starting her set just after 10 PM, Dua opened with an impressive sequence of five songs: “Training Season,” “One Kiss,” “Illusion,” “Break My Heart,” and “Levitating.” Each number showcased her flawless choreography and energetic stage presence, maintaining an electrifying pace throughout the night.
The night featured five costume changes, with a recurring theme of heavy studs and leather. She performed 15 top 40 hits, including “Don’t Start Now,” “Physical,” and “New Rules,” alongside collaborations with Elton John (“Cold Heart”) and Mark Ronson (“Electricity”). Interestingly, she chose not to perform her hit “Dance The Night,” which was only played as a video interlude during one of her costume changes.
Her distinctive raspy mezzo-soprano voice resonated beautifully through the Somerset air, especially on the ballad “Happy For You” and the sensuous “Houdini,” which closed her set. The 28-year-old also paid homage to Shakespear’s Sister, one of Glastonbury’s earliest female headliners, by wearing a t-shirt featuring their album cover “Hormonally Yours.”
Throughout her performance, Dua frequently expressed her gratitude and disbelief at headlining Glastonbury, a dream she had nurtured long before recording her first album. She reminisced about her early days, playing to small crowds and feeling overwhelmed by the massive audience that now stretched back to Rowmead.
Almost 100,000 fans gathered to watch her, and Dua’s connection with them was palpable. One memorable moment was when she ran down to the barriers to join the crowd in singing “Be The One,” a scene reminiscent of her previous Glastonbury appearance in 2017. Despite being planned, her joy at interacting with her fans was undeniably genuine.
In a rare unscripted segment, Dua was joined on stage by Kevin Parker of Tame Impala, her collaborator on her new album “Radical Optimism.” Freed from her rigorous choreography, she simply enjoyed the moment, giving fans a glimpse of her true self. “Tonight I get to pretend I’m in Tame Impala,” she gleamed.
While some critics noted that the show felt heavily aimed at a global TV audience and lacked spontaneity due to its elaborate dance routines, the audience’s attention never faltered. The setlist cleverly balanced new material with familiar hits, ensuring there was always a crowd-pleaser just around the corner.
Dua had promised to transform Glastonbury into a nightclub, and she delivered. Her songs were reimagined with influences from the 90s rave scene, and her breakout hit “New Rules” was ingeniously mashed up with Bicep’s “Glue.” The result was a performance that felt like an exclusive European nightclub, magnified to fit Glastonbury’s grand scale.
In a unique twist, Dua even performed on a second, smaller stage—a privilege rarely afforded to Glastonbury headliners. But then again, not everyone is Dua Lipa.
