WILLOW reveals her rock opera ambitions at Reading 2022

WILLOW made her Reading Festival main stage debut today (Sunday August 28) – revealing her ambition to one day make a “rock opera”.

Delivering heavy cuts from her her acclaimed fourth studio album, ‘lately i feel Everything’,the rocker opened with her viral TikTok smash ‘t r a n s p a r e n t s o u l’.

Then, she told the crowd of her unlikely dream: “I know this isn’t a popular opinion – my opinions aren’t often popular – but I would love to make a rock opera one day.”

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She joked about the niche ambition before performing a guitar-heavy version of ‘Lipstick’, adding: “Nobody’s got to scream. Nobody’s gotta clap. I know that’s not something people think about on a daily basis. But, if I were ever to make a rock opera, this song would have to be on it”.

  • READ MORE: Willow on the cover: “Humans have never been good at accepting that people are different”

The 21-year-old has just finished opening up for Machine Gun Kelly and Billie Eilish on their the respective tours. Recalling the experience, she told the audience: “Damn, so I just got off tour where I was playing in a lot of rooms in ceilings. I couldn’t see the sky. There wasn’t any fresh air. It wasn’t like this.

“This is how music is supposed to be; in nature, looking at the sky, the trees. Just being here so vulnerable for all of us.”

Reading Festival concludes today, with The 1975, Halsey and Charli XCX while Bring Me The Horizon, Wolf Alice and Arctic Monkeys are set to close Leeds Festival.

Check back at NME here for the latest news, reviews, photos, interviews and more from Reading & Leeds 2022.