This was Coachella 2008
So this last weekend was, of course, the latest iteration of one of the premier music festivals in the nation - and, OK, probably the world. For the first time, I was there for all 3 days of Coachella this year, which turned out to be one of my better plans, since this weekend provided me with one of the best concert experiences - if not the best concert experience - of my life.
Yeah, I know: sensational much? Not really. While I've seen my fair share of excellent shows by a single artist/group, or even a day full of good performances, this was 3 days of amazing sets by a mind-boggling variety of artists young and old, upstart and historic. Everything I love about music and performance was showcased at one point or another during the weekend: from the unpredictable antics of Les Savy Fav to the flawless musicianship of My Morning Jacket to the raw jubilation of Dan Deacon to the epic audiovisual thematics accompanying Roger Waters, it's pretty amazing how varied and strong the entire festival was. I couldn't even choose a favorite act, to be honest.
That's the short version, but if you want more details, keep reading. I've also stolen a bunch of photos from flickr and elsewhere on the net for illustration - and, unlike some past entires, these photos are for real.
Harrington can't see who's rocking the party from way up there.
Friday started off nuts with an early afternoon set from Les Savy Fav. It was hot as hell without a cloud in the sky (as we've come to expect from Coachella), but that didn't stop insane and probably drunk LSF frontman Tim Harrington from jumping around the stage in various states of undress, climbing on scaffolding, groping fans, and otherwise putting an incredible amount of screaming, raving energy into what could have easily been a subdued, let's-just-get-through-this-alive set. And yes, the photo on the left shows Harrington climbing over three stories up to the top of the scaffolding - with mic plugged in but without a safety net - to lead the crowd through "Who Rocks the Party". I was a little afraid this would be That Infamous Show Where the Guy From Les Savy Fav Fell to His Death, especially when he started dangling - but before long the guy climbed down without incident, and we all breathed a sigh of relief.
Up next was Dan Deacon, who I hoped would be worth it since I was missing the Battles set a few tents away. And, wow, was it ever. Though his music by itself doesn't grab me as much as a lot of indie dance acts, transformed into the live experience it becomes an infectious monster that can't be ignored. But a lot of it has to do with Deacon himself, who has got to be the least pretentious guy in the scene. For one thing, he doesn't even play from the stage; he plays at the front of the floor itself, nearly surrounded by dancing sweaty bodies, often joining in on the fracas himself. And for a few songs at the end, he set up some strange dancing games that asked the crowd to create an ever-growing tunnel of arm links, or to have several guys run around in a circle high-fiving the crowd, pulling more people into the circle until the whole tent was high-fiving each other in merry chaos. Listen, this was probably the most unabashed fun I had the whole weekend, and I'm really looking forward to seeing what kind of nuts shit goes on when this guy headlines his own, longer-than-45-minutes show. When he comes back into town, I'm going, you're going, everyone we know is going. So be ready!
Cut Copy came on next, and they rocked pretty hard as well. They had a tough act to follow but performed admirably, playing "So Haunted" and "Lights & Music" and all the other jams we wanted to hear. Also of note: the lead singer looks eerily like Stephen Malkmus.
We caught the tail end of Vampire Weekend, who seemed fine enough. I like their sound just fine, but don't really think they warrant the hype that surrounds them, so they weren't a big priority for me. After them were The National, who were predictably solid. Clearly going all out for the big festival, they had a piano and a small horn section on hand to add even more layers to their textured sound. I've seen these guys several times, yet they always manage to keep their songs sounding fresh, changing up rhythms and adding new little touches all the time. And they even played "Ada"!
After The National was some group we'd never heard of called The Swell Season, so we went nearby to grab a bite to eat. Over dinner, we were still in earshot of the stage, and suddenly realized that their third song sounded like a cover of the Oscar-winning song from Once, "Falling Slowly". Then we realized it actually was the song... and then began to suspect that the singers were the actual actors from Once. We ran over and our beliefs were confirmed; we listened on as they covered The Pixies, and then Kraftwerk! Weird stuff, but fun.
from rollingstone.com. Can you find me in the Dan Deacon crowd? Look carefully.
We checked out a few songs from The Verve - I was never a big fan, but they actually sounded pretty damn good. Ditto with Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings. The best part was the short, stout Jones inviting a tall, awkward white dude on stage so she could sing a love song to him. Fatboy Slim was way late to the stage, so I missed him - instead I saw Professor Murder, a really great up-and-coming reggae-influenced indie rock act from Brooklyn. The crowd was really small, but once they put out a full-length I'm sure they'll find more fans. Also, weirdly coincidental that the band who took their name from a Mr. Show character has a lead singer looks a lot like David Cross.
Saturday afternoon found us huddling in shade as long as possible. The heat was serious, and only a light wind kept us alert and energetic. After a lazy, long-distance observation of VHS or Beta and Minus the Bear, we headed over to MGMT, who were (thank god) playing in a tent. Their set started a little slow, but by the time their hit singles rolled around I couldn't be happier, even despite the bleach-blonde girls gone wild reject next to me who had probably been drunk since noon, staggering all over the place and screaming "WHOOOO!" at every possible instance.
this is probably what the show looked like when you weren't being trampled to death.
I caught a little of Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks. I love Pavement, and I like SM's solo work a lot, but his new album was too jammy even for my tastes, and unfortunately my constant hope for an all-Pavement covers show (they happen! sometimes) went up in smoke, so after a few songs I moved over to the dance tent in preparation for Hot Chip. Some guy - the internet tells me he's Erol Alkan - was DJing some house/techno whatever, and I'm not a raver but I gotta say it was pretty damn fun to dance to. After his set the tent filled up real fast for Hot Chip. Thankfully, unlike last year's "Hot Chip in the Tent" show, it was a little cooler and the breeze kept us from roasting alive. The set, of course, was fantastic, if pretty similar to what they played last year. At least this time I knew the words!
Islands was late to start, so I couldn't watch them for long - they seemed interesting enough, but dammit, I had to get a good spot back in the dance tent for MIA. So back I went to dance in front of another DJ - this one Junkie XL, I guess - and it was also really fun. But the crowd got thicker and thicker and thicker until, just before MIA, there was barely any room to move. Definitely no room to dance. But some assholes were charging through the crowd anyway, shamelessly pushing everyone and anyone to get... I dunno where. Two guys next to me got into a fight - like a typical bar fight, "fuck you, nigga, no FUCK YOU, nigga", which was pretty much the antithesis of everything else going on in the festival.
we almost didn't care what happened to Prince once Morris Day kicked out the jams.
OH FUCK PRIIINNNCE
Overall MIA was probably the biggest disappointment of the weekend. Not just because the crowd was one of the worst I'd ever seen, but MIA herself - despite a pretty impressive visual show this weird-ass costumes and cool video clips - seemed kind of out of it, threatening to leave the stage several times if the house lights weren't turned off (even though they didn't look on to me). Plus there were lots of technical snafus, causing four different "Paper Planes" false starts throughout the set. The gunshot sound effect was over-used ten minutes in, but that didn't stop the DJ from using it over... and over... and over. And god, that crowd! I couldn't even leave early. It was almost enough to swear me off of festivals... except...
Directly after a great moody set from Portishead, Prince took the stage, and rocked all of our faces off. I never thought I would be that excited over a Prince show. Sure, I heard he was a good performer, but I was never a big fan of his stuff. Regardless, he had me - and everyone - in the palm of his hand from minute one. This man is a fucking performer, as are all the people he surrounded himself with, including Morris Day (!) and Sheila E. And yeah, he covered "Creep", slowing down the beat and twisting some of the words, then led us through a fist-pumping cover of "Come Together". And of course there was "Purple Rain". No "Kiss", but still an amazing, 2-hour, larger than life performance I'm not likely to forget anytime soon.
Sunday found the tiredness catching up to us. Lots of dancing and lots of sun plus little sleep equaled a potentially sluggish afternoon, and once again it began with lazy chilling in the shade watching whoever happened to be in the shade - in this case it was The Cool Kids, bragging to the crowd how they brought their moms to the show, and how many other hip-hop acts we know of do that?
At the risk of missing Sean Penn's first performance, we headed over to watch I'm From Barcelona, who right out of the gate were crazy nuts fun. First of all, there were 17 of them. Secondly, one of them was a superhero in a red cape who showed us the hippest Swedish dance moves. Thirdly, they immediately threw giant red balloons at us ("Perhaps you can help us," implored the lead singer, "We're being attacked by red balloons"). They jumped right into infectious versions of "Treehouse", "Oversleeping" and all kinds of other songs I can't remember the names of. It felt like we were on some cracked-out episode of Captain Kangaroo, but we couldn't be happier. "You guys aren't strangers anymore," the lead singer told us, "You're part of our family." Fittingly, the last song ended with a conga-line made up of band and crowd alike.
Emily convinced me to stick around for a few songs from Duffy, who, like Amy Winehouse, is a soul singer from the UK (even her first name, wisely dropped, is "Aimee"). Her stuff was nice enough, but not really my thing. Plus, I wanted to get over and see The Field for a few minutes before heading over to Stars. But their stage was empty, and the crew didn't even look close to being finished setting up. Were they just way late getting started? After sitting around for a few minutes, I grabbed some food and headed for Stars. I found out the next day The Field had had to cancel ahead of time. Guess nobody thought to put up a sign?
Stars were pretty good, and my only real chance to see the Arts & Crafts collective since I was not gonna be able to see Metric later in the day. After them was Gogol Bordello, who I had been warned about but still surprised me with their incredible stamina and skill. I think saying "they have the energy of a hundred Zachs" is pretty accurate. Not too familiar with their music, but goddamn did they put on a show. Afterwards was a public service announcement from a drunk and/or stoned Sean Penn, who wanted us all to get on his bus the next day (?) to travel down to New Orleans with Everlast (??) to somehow help poor folks, though he could remember where we needed to sign up (?!), telling us "you guys know where it is" (?!??). Apparently he got some takers anyway.
"Attack", yelled the Swedes, "ATTACK"
My Morning Jacket took the stage, and promptly knocked every song out of the park. I was glad I boned up on the awesome newer songs like "Evil Urges" and "Touch Me I'm Going to Scream Part 2", while "Anytime" was a welcome surprise and "Lay Low" was as badass as I could have hoped. But before I knew it, they were off the stage, and it was time for the main event.
OK, I was looking forward to Roger Waters. I love Pink Floyd, and I'd heard good things about his solo tour. But none of that really prepared me for the kind of spectacle this show was. 2 and a half hours of pitch-perfect Pink Floyd songs from The Wall, Wish You Were Here, Animals, fuck, even The Final Cut, with ridiculous larger-than-life set pieces, insane pyrotechnics and multimedia extravaganzas that were actually thematically relevant to the music. And yes, a giant inflatable pig that implored us to vote Obama. This was nostalgia rebuilt and remodeled; the big, epic experience that made Pink Floyd's records feel almost two-dimensional in comparison. Waters and his army of incredible musicians did indeed play the entirety of Dark Side of the Moon, which ended with an incredible rotating 3-dimensional light sculpture of the album's iconic prism refraction, bathing the crowd in a rainbow of light. Then an encore with "Another Brick in the Wall pt. 2" and "Comfortably Numb", and we were let out into the night. Justice was actually still playing in a tent nearby, but I passed, figuring they would be a little disappointing after the spectacle I'd just witnessed. I was tired and satisfied enough as it was.
apparently, when the pig floated up into the sky shortly after this picture was taken, that wasn't supposed to happen.
So that was the weekend. I'm sure it helped that we had awesome lodging in Palm Springs, and I think I've figured out a good way to avoid most of the traffic grief that generally comes with the Coachella situation. And, more importantly, I got to share a lot of the above experiences with some of my best friends... even though many more were missing, which is too bad, because I know a lot of you would have enjoyed it.
Coachella is seriously getting better every year. Who's up for 2009?