Glass Animals are in our heads at Reading Festival

Pineapples. Pineapples are banned at Reading Festival. Did you know? Did you hear about the pineapples? Yeah, pineapples! Banned! At Reading Festival! That's the conversation leading up to Glass Animals' appearance at this year's Reading & Leeds. A thinly veiled joke from the festival organisers has launched a great band into a circus of international news, as outlets around the globe pick up on the fruit based fun. It's attention that the band don't only deserve, but thrive under, even if it is a little - y'know - weird. Then again, weird is what Glass Animals do best. Like Everything Everything before them, they do pop music, but not quite as we know it. 'Life Itself' is stickier than superglue, packing more hooks than an industrial length of velcro, but it never once feels conventional, boring or expected. 'Black Mambo' slithers and slides, while 'Youth' stalks, occasionally breaking cover to explode in blinding light. There's always a feeling that Glass Animals are a band operating off a plan we all enjoy, but only they can ever truly translate. Of course, there's only one song that's ever going to bring their set to a climax. With 'Pork Soda' come those contraband pineapples. As their giant king fruit shimmers on stage, giant inflatables appear from the crowd. They're everywhere. Pineapples! At Reading Festival! Turns out you really can't keep a good band (or pineapple) down. <em>Photos: Corinne Cumming / Dork</em>