Each generation measures the cost of communal joy differently, and Glastonbury's crossing of the £400 threshold in 2027 marks a quiet reckoning with what shared cultural ritual is now worth in an economy reshaped by pandemic, Brexit, and inflation. The Somerset festival, returning after a fallow year, will ask attendees to pay £408 for a weekend that sells out in minutes — a price that reflects not greed so much as the accumulated weight of energy bills, labour shortages, and a decade of rising infrastructure demands. That thousands will still queue, registered and ready, speaks to something b