Josh Cake has travelled the world performing his poetry in places like Paris, London, Warsaw, and New York, and at festivals including Edinburgh Fringe, Adelaide Fringe, Sonic Poetry Festival, and the Melbourne International Comedy Festival.
Now he brings his work – from his collections Breakwater Review, Teesta Review, Paris Lit Up, The Anti-Misogyny Club, and Cordite – to Glastonbury Festival where he performs in the Poetry&Words tent.
We caught up with Cake to find out what it’s like to be performing at the festival.
Can you tell us a little about yourself?
I’m a poet, musician, and comedian from Melbourne, Australia. Over the past year, I have performed poetry features in Paris, Berlin, Warsaw, Brussels, London, Edinburgh, Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, and New York. I just moved to Edinburgh in May and am currently touring a poetry album called ‘my poems pay taxes; my taxes buy weapons; my weapons kill poets’.
How did you get into live performance?
I joined musical theatre groups at uni, then started singing my own funny songs at student open mic nights. My first paid performance work was playing music at weddings. From there it’s been a rolling mess of poetry, piano bars, accompanying other artists (from singers to clowns), stand-up, sketch, improv, and musical comedy.
What’s it like to be performing at this year’s Glastonbury Festival?
It sounds fun! It’s my first time so I’ve been reading a few online guides and trying to prepare myself with plenty of information. There are a few poets on the line-up with whom I’ve performed before, so it’ll be lovely to see some old friends and make some new ones.
What can you tell us about your plans for the show/s?
I’ll do some really funny poems and some really sad ones. There’s a lot of absurdity and nonsense in the systems of money and power that govern our world, so we can definitely have a laugh at that. But at the same time, we need to acknowledge that these systems kill people.
When a country is complicit in genocide, I think it’s important to address it, especially at major cultural events. If we persuade our government to stop selling weaponry to Israel, it will save lives in Palestine. I’m going to talk about those horrors, for sure.
How do you approach performing at a festival like this?
AI rehearse every day and I plan every detail that I can. In the two weeks before Glastonbury, I’ll perform poems at Hidden Door Festival in Edinburgh and in Paris, so that should warm me up a little. I’ll arrive on Wednesday afternoon and check out the festival on Wednesday and Thursday, so that by the time I perform on Friday and Saturday, I should be used to the environment and have a plan to be comfortable. For example, I’ll know the distance to the nearest bathroom and what time I should head there before my sets. I want to listen to all the other poets all day long, so I’ll make some plans around snacks and hydration.
Will you be checking out any other acts across the weekend?
Yes! Every single poet. Particularly keen for Sophia Lucia who gave me some of my biggest laughs of 2024, and for Naomi Wood’s show ‘Gobbess’. I saw it at Edinburgh Fringe last year and it sets such a high standard for performing poetry. I’m excited to watch it again.
Other than that, I want to check out the food, because cooks are my favourite artists. And there are so many musicians I’d love to see live, like Doechii, Billy Bragg, and Kneecap.
Josh Cake performs in the Theatre & Circus fields at Glastonbury Festival 2025
