During the monorail ride at the Newark Airport, most of the talk was about how “crazy” the weekend would be at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival. The lineup was particularly strong this year, boasting Thom Yorke, The xx, Phoenix, Tiesto, and Spoon, to name a few. I was traveling with a group of post-thesis seniors ready to get our Bacchus on in a strange trip through the desert. I didn’t know a lot of the people on the trip all that well, but I’ve found that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Experi- ences like these are good ways to make friends.
The amount of substances people put in their bodies when they go on vacation is amazing. We ordered beers at the hotel bar. Xanax was popped out of pre-flight anxiety. The pregame in the airport bar can be justified the same way. We boarded a party bus the following morning and immediately proceeded to blast The Lonely Island’s “I’m on a Boat.” We drank champagne and imported beer. We sang CCR’s “Fortunate One” at the top of our lungs, refusing to let the irony of the situation ruin our good time.
If you want to get an idea of what the apocalypse might be like, the Coachella Festival would be an interesting experiment. The desert locale gives a good approximation of what affect a nuclear apocalypse might have on the landscape. While the lineup for the festival was spectacular, the volunteer staff was anything but. Few of the people I encountered were very knowledgeable about what was going on. I heard various stories of people asking where things were only to receive bemused looks. They weren’t even scanning people’s tickets at the entrance; more than a few people sneaking in.
Once we got to the hotel, we went to the pool. We ordered piña coladas. We traded copies of _Vanity Fair_ and _GQ_. We ate continental breakfasts: stacks of French toast with syrup layered on top, eggs Benedict, and pep- pered bacon. We drank mimosas, screwdrivers, and coffees. At the festival we ate falafels, corn dogs, and garlic fries. We drank Heinekens, Margaritas, and root beer floats. We met friends from other schools. We made friends with people we didn’t know. There was legally prescribed marijuana. There was cocaine. There were pills. Suffice it to say, there was a lot of chain-smoking going on.
Most of the people there were young and attractive, which is consistent with apocalyptic trends, given that once the apocalypse comes, the old will be killed, and their flesh eaten. Come to think of it, there was a lot of flesh at the festival. Lots of tattoos. Girls were dressed for comfort, but a little hipper than those at your average music festival. I saw more than a few of them strutting around in fur boots that reached to their knees.
When you go to music festivals with large groups of people, it becomes less about the music, more about going with the flow. Ultimately, festivals are about enjoyment, but often the trials of getting to a crowded place to see famous people can be very tedious, sometimes torturous. The weather was cool on Friday, hot as hell on Saturday and Sunday.
Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros gave what was probably the best performance of the festival. Looking like a dread-locked Iggy Pop, singer Alex Ebert owned the crowd from the stage. Singing coolly, Jade Castrinos provided the perfect complement to Ebert’s antics.
I only saw one celebrity while I was there: Aaron Paul, the guy who plays Jesse Pinkman on AMC’s _Breaking Bad_. He was much shorter than I expected. The cast of _It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia_ was also spotted. I only caught a little bit of Thom Yorke’s performance. Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers played bass behind Yorke’s banshee whispers. Both Camera Obscura and the xx gave great-sounding, medium energy performances, which is what you would expect from hipster make-up music.
Die Antwood, an Afrikaaner hip hop group, gave the greatest twenty-minute performance I’ve ever seen. The two MCs looked like extras from a Vanilla Ice video. My musical highlight was leaving Tiesto early to catch Sia (also of Zero 7) perform in an intimate setting. Her rendition of “Breathe Me” was particularly sweet. By far the most impressive feat of the festival was the guitarist of Old Crow Medicine Show restringing and tuning his guitar during the verse of a song, just in time to make the chorus.
It gives me joy to report that Julian Casablancas moved around the stage a little bit during his performance, as opposed to remaining in his trademark angsting-into-the-microphone/too-drunk-to-move stance. I also caught the end of Them Crooked Vultures: Dave Grohl laying down the beat in a sleeveless tee, dad-arms bared; Josh Homme, looking not unlike an Irish linebacker, playing a guitar that’s too small for his body; and the legendarily legendary legend that is John Paul Jones. Legend.
If you want to get an idea of what the apocalypse might be like, the Coachella Festival would be an interesting experiment. The desert locale gives a good approximation of what affect a nuclear apocalypse might have on the landscape. While the lineup for the festival was spectacular, the volunteer staff was anything but. Few of the people I encoun- tered were very knowledgeable about what was going on. I heard various stories of people asking where things were only to receive bemused looks. They weren’t even scanning people’s tickets at the entrance; more than a few people sneaking in.
Most of the people there were young and attractive, which is consistent with apocalyptic trends, given that once the apocalypse comes, the old will be killed, and their flesh eaten. Come to think of it, there was a lot of flesh at the festival. Lots of tattoos. Girls were dressed for comfort, but a little hipper than those at your average music festival. I saw more than a few of them strutting around in fur boots that reached to their knees.
The weirdest thing about Coachella was the tatted up high schoolers with eyes like black tapioca balls, rubbing Vicks Vap-o-rub on one another and playing with glow sticks. Part of this experience may have had something to do with being sober while watching DJ David Guetta perform.
“Are you ready to party?” he called out in his funny accent. Communicating with young people all over the world, many of them on drugs, has affected the way David Guetta addresses his audience. He speaks in short, declarative sentences, reaching his arms out when he says something particularly emotionally-involving, which is pretty much everything once the Molly sets in. “I love you guys!” “I want everyone to put up their cell phone right now.” “I will see the lights and remember this forever!”