Coachella | 04.25-04.27 | Indio, CA

Words by: Forrest Reda

Coachella Music Festival :: 04.25-04.27 :: Empire Polo Field :: Indio, CA

Coachella was giant in 2008. The festival had bigger lights, bigger sound and promoter Goldenvoice took a chance and picked three headliners that didn’t have the massive name value or reunion hype of years past. With stacks of quality performances and a multitude of exhilarating moments, Coachella, now eight years old, proved it is bigger than just the acts on the bill.

2008 is the year of the green festival. Coachella stepped up its efforts to be carbon neutral by once again providing incentive to carpool through the Carpoolchella “tickets for life” program (groups of four arriving with decorated cars were eligible to win tickets for life handed out by spotters in the parking lot) and the first annual “Coachella Express,” which provided campers free transportation from downtown L.A. to the festival on Thursday afternoon through a partnership with Amtrak. Once people were inside the festival, they could trade-in ten empties for one bottle of water. While Coachella strives to avoid politics, The Energy Factory installation greeted people after they passed security with ways to conserve energy and use alternative fuels. You could also ride a stationary bicycle to recharge your phone.

Lots of people come to Coachella for the parties and the scene but the true spirit of the festival is art and music. This year there was a nice selection of new art exhibits and returning favorites like the twin Tesla coils and Do Lab, where sparks fly night and day. There were also a couple of great return bands and plenty of returning fans. Once again, the green grass of the polo grounds teemed with hipsters, hotties and hippies. There was also an infusion of moms and dads, and even a couple grandmas, likely due to the presence of “mature artists” like Roger Waters, Sharon Jones, Dwight Yoakam, Carbon/Silicon and Prince.

Friday :: 04.25

Coachella is not the place to see complete sets until the headliners get to the stage. It’s a chance to see lots of bands, and it’s a safe assumption that any hungry music fan could catch at least 15 acts a day. If that sounds like a lot, consider that there were 43 artists on Friday alone.

Coachella is like baseball – if you hit .333 percent of the bands you are an All-Star. That amounted to about 14 of the 43 bands on Friday. It was really hot on Friday afternoon, and festival traffic had severely sapped our buzz. The trick with Coachella is to arrive Thursday night, but that didn’t happen and we sat in traffic on Friday and arrived just as Rogue Wave was wrapping up the opening Main Stage set of the festival. John Butler seemed to enjoy the California vibe of the festival and later told me that he was enjoying a holiday with his family. Butler said he views the festival not as an American festival but rather said, “It feels pretty Californian, and that’s not necessarily American.” Butler also said the greening of the festival circuit was “common sense taking place,” and hopes it continues. I asked Butler what his favorite part about touring America was and he told me it was the audience. “That’s why we come here, to play for people and they are very enthusiastic, passionate people.”

Slightly Stoopid made their Coachella debut with support from their fans and got things smoking on the Main Stage. The cover of Nirvana’s “Territorial Pissings” absolutely electrified the crowd and Kyle McDonald dedicated the song to Kurt Cobain. While some in the crowd seemed, well, pissed that the band played the Nirvana song, claiming that Cobain would have hated Slightly Stoopid’s “bro-rock,” most jumped to the song and enjoyed the pitch-perfect rendition of an alt-90s classic.

After Slightly Stoopid, the Coachella marathon began. The next set you want to see begins 10 minutes before the set you are watching ends. You have to trust your decisions, and never look back. One of the quirks of Coachella is that the schedule guide isn’t released until just before the festival. I’ve tried to plan my days out in advance before but I can never really choose the acts I want to see until I get the pocket-sized sched when I enter the festival grounds.

With this in mind I grabbed just a taste of “Thriller” bumping out of Busy P‘s Sahara Tent set before jetting off for the Outdoor Theater to witness Architecture in Helsinki wrap-up their set with “Heart It Races.” The song was simply magnificent. The freaks from down-under deserve all the adoration bands like Dr. Dog give them. They are like a slightly weirder and more dressed down Arcade Fire.

I hurried back to check The Breeders on the Main Stage, a band whose influence on girls that rock grows more apparent every year. It was nice to see Kim Deal back on stage with her sister.

It was time for Vampire Weekend. VW is one of the most hyped bands of the year, but when lead singer Ezra Koenig took the stage with dark sunglasses, an East Coast smirk, folded up pink corduroys and deck shoes without socks, I couldn’t help but grin. Too often NYC buzz bands come out West and wilt in the heat, but Vampire Weekend’s music fit right in with the desert oasis location. The band’s shit-eating grins belied the confidence that their sunshine-speckled sailboat rock – equal parts Graceland and Stop Making Sense with just a pinch of solo John Lennon circa “Dear Yoko” – was perfect for the setting. Vampire Weekend received a great response and the band deserves its buzz.

I listened as long as I could before running back to the Coachella Stage for Tegan & Sara, who were making their second visit to the festival. Returning acts were a theme of the weekend and Tegan & Sara set a high standard. They shook off nerves with endearing stage banter and had a fun time doing it. Tegan & Sara rocked. They were super-cute, with haircuts that every emo boy at the festival lusted after. They are simply adorable and when they sang, “I’m not unfaithful, but I stray,” I thought to myself that I would probably take her back if she sang that to me.

Guys and girls of every orientation want to take Tegan & Sarah home, but I left early to check out The National. I was just hitting my festival stride and The National set the pace. Lead singer Matt Berninger has what the old-timers call a radio voice and guitarist Scott Devendorf plays the music better than it sounds on record.

I left the Outdoor Theater a fan of The National and ready to rock out back at the Main Stage with The Raconteurs. Brendan Benson and Jack White together is alt-rock’s wet dream. White with a traditional rock & roll band is as good as it gets, but the reason The Raconteurs blow minds live is that they play the blues. Keith Richards clearly gave White the “Pick of Destiny” but The Raconteurs work because of the group dynamic. Benson’s wail bleeds into White’s desperate screams. This is now, this is blues-rock for rock’s sake, and even if Consoler’s of the Lonely doesn’t have another “Steady As She Goes,” The Raconteurs remain one of the very best live acts to see in 2008.

I walked towards Goldfrapp in the packed Sahara Tent, stopping to check out Santogold at the Gobi Tent on the way. The crowds were showing major love to both females. Goldfrapp was elegant and her band laid down dark grooves as dusk turned to nightfall. The music was the change-up I needed before The Swell Season hit the stage.

If you don’t know The Swell Season, it’s the guy (Glen Hansard) and girl (Marketa Irglova) from the film Once. And if you didn’t pay attention to movies in 2007, Once is the little indie film that won Best Song at the Oscars for “Falling Slowly.” If you still can’t place The Swell Season, it’s The Frames with a girl on piano.

Hansard took the stage alone and belted out a few of his songs. The only difference between this and his busking days was the huge sound system that carried his music to every corner of the polo fields. Marketa eventually came out and the two played “Falling Slowly” and Hansard admitted that he felt like the song was a ball that he kicked over the fence in his backyard. But instead of landing in his neighbor’s yard it had kept going and now all Hansard wanted was “my fucking ball back.” He also mentioned The Frames’ sound-and-sun plagued set from the previous year, telling the crowd that playing outside in the heat and sun is a dangerous combination for Irishmen. “We Irishmen live in a state of perpetual twilight. Put us in this weather and the results are not good. We wilt in the heat,” he lamented. In the dark with his best girl, Hansard absolutely shined. He’s an artist that can command the stage with just an acoustic guitar and a microphone.

The Verve was one of the most anticipated acts at Coachella and the venerable English band left it all on the stage, playing like it was 1995 all over again. The Verve started “Bittersweet Symphony” with a tone reminiscent of Pink Floyd and a dedication to Hunter S. Thompson. It was a touching tribute to someone who, despite writing a book entitled Polo is My Life, never made it to the polo grounds, but his spirit lives within this festival or wherever freaks gather. Richard Ashcroft‘s voice is still the best in Brit rock and “The Drug’s Don’t Work” and “Lucky Man” were Coachella moments enjoyed by fans dancing, blissful to have their favorite band back.

I took another lap across the festival to see Sharon Jones and The Dap-Kings. The grand lady of soul can still shake her tail-feather and sings like there’s no tomorrow. She was getting in touch with her African roots on stage, showing the crowd how proud she is of her heritage and absolutely working it. Amy Winehouse has the voice down, but she won’t be a true diva until she can shake it like Sharon.

Lot of people checked out The Black Lips and Fatboy Slim but I had been going basically non-stop all day and was ready to relax with Jack Johnson.

Since his first appearance at Coachella in 2002, Jack Johnson has become one of the biggest touring acts in the world, yet his demeanor is basically the same. One thing that has changed is the stage dressing. For Coachella, there were several screens arranged on the stage with tropical scenery and black and white live images of Johnson. He still mostly plays with his eyes closed but his already-good live show is better than ever with keyboardist Zach Gill (ALO) adding grooves and vocals to complement Adam Topol‘s drumming, Merlo‘s steady bass and Johnson’s use of acoustic and electric guitar.

The songs are the focal point of Johnson’s set. The crowd sings along and there really isn’t a better vibe than a warm night under the stars at a Jack Johnson show. A few songs from his new album were featured but the set was a deft mixture of his whole catalog. Johnson made his Coachella set extra special by inviting Matt Costa and Mason Jennings up for some songs, the highlight being Jennings leading everybody in a song that got full crowd participation and delivered a feel-good message about loving everybody the same, no matter what religion.

For the first time in six trips to the desert, I camped out at Coachella. It was part curiosity and party necessity, and I knew I had a nice place to stay on Sunday night, so the decision was made to rough it for the first two nights. The campground staff was helpful and friendly. The campground is clearly marked into rows with spaces marked on the grass for each tent. The inevitable drum circle went quite late, but we were tired enough to fall asleep quickly and the grass under our tent was soft and flat.

Continue reading for Saturday coverage…

Saturday :: 04.26

We woke up to a hot Saturday and sampled the showers and some food before heading back into the festival early to catch The Bird and The Bee, which featured a bevy of beauties on instruments led by Greg Kurstin and Inara George. A friend had suggested I check out Yoav, so we caught his set in the Gobi Tent and were enthralled by his use of a loop pedal, his finger tapping percussion on the guitar and his clear voice. He covered Radiohead’s “Everything In Its Right Place” and nailed it, making a great impression on those present.

We listened to a little of VHS or Beta at the Main Stage, but it was just too hot so we relaxed on the grass in the Mojave and Gobi Tents listening to The Teenagers and Carbon/Silicon waiting for Man Man. Carbon/Silicon played a great cover of Buddy Holly’s “Not Fade Away” that drew us in. It was a joy to see the legendary Mick Jones (The Clash) on guitar and the next two songs, “War On Culture” and “Soylent Green,” were two vintage blasts of English rock.

Man Man was a bolt of energy. The band’s equipment was set up in a tight formation, no doubt to maximize the space on stage in small clubs. As the name suggests, Man Man is a group of hyperactive bearded and mustachioed guys who beat their drums and keyboards with manic intensity. They energized the tent and it was a tough decision to leave the Mojave to catch a few minutes of Minus The Bear, who did their best in the stifling heat to engage the crowd and sounded just as nice on the huge speakers at Coachella as they do in theaters. The heat may have affected me, but it seemed like they jammed more than usual. At any rate, lead guitarist Jake Snider let his emotions out through his instrument as he relentlessly plowed through the set. His hair hung in his face and he had his guitar tech tuning his guitars, swapping them out after each song.

MGMT surprised me with their youth and how well they sounded. “The Youth Is Starting To Change” and they dig MGMT. Look for them to push to the next level. The songs and skill are in place, and even playing against The Cold War Kids, the Mojave Tent was packed. Cold War Kids were a must-see for us and they didn’t disappoint. Whatever expectations may have been laid out for them were more than exceeded by the first three songs. They played loud, frenetic, emotionally charged rock that sounded way too vintage to be coming from them. They are working class heroes for a new generation.

Stephen Malkmus & the Jicks droned that sweet white noise at the Outdoor Theatre and Kate Nash sang some sweet things in the Mojave Tent but our next destination was Hot Chip in the Sahara. By the time Hot Chip took the stage the tent was overflowing. For being synthesizer based, Hot Chip rocks, and the music is contagious. I’m now a full-on fan.

Death Cab For Cutie played to a field full of hipsters that swayed and sang as Ben Gibbard and company weaved through a beautiful set that was an ideal soundtrack for the waning sun. They even cheered for “Why You’d Want to Live Here,” an unapologetic diss on living in Los Angeles, but the song of the set was “Soul Meets Body” with Gibbard on acoustic guitar and the crowd on vocals.

We sat for awhile in the back at Rilo Kiley, resting for the last segment before heading to the Sahara Tent for M.I.A The crowd for M.I.A. at Coachella was larger than Madonna’s dance set from two years ago. We tried our best to weather the storm of humanity but it was too packed, too crazy, and we gave up and tried for Animal Collective, which was also packed. These guys make unique music that absolutely messes with your head and redefines traditional song structures into something new and exciting.

Next was Mark Ronson. After listening to Version for a year, and being a fan of his Amy Winehouse production, my expectations for his set were too high. He seemed a little nervous, and why not? He hasn’t done a proper L.A. show before and here he was on the Outdoor Theatre going up against M.I.A., Animal Collective and Portishead. He took long drinks from a bottle of Jack Daniels and breathed in his cigarette. His set was a little bit too tricky to pull off – an evening in a theater would have been fine – but at Coachella it was too disjointed to dedicate one’s self to. The version of “Back to Black” left me wanting the original, and inviting Ricky Wilson from Kaiser Chiefs on stage to steal back his song from Lily Allen didn’t resonate nearly as much as the Kaiser Chief’s set last year.

I left Ronson to catch Portishead. The music bathed the festival grounds with memories of a special time when the band set the groundwork for what would become trip-hop. However, the grandeur of the music wasn’t nostalgia. It was relevant, magic and executed brilliantly.

I enjoyed every minute of Prince‘s set, and like everybody else, I danced, swayed and sang along. I’d seen Prince once before on his Musicology tour but this was the extended Prince Revue with Morris Day and the Time warming things up, Sheila E singing and banging on drums (still a knock-out) and the one and only Prince, a sexual dynamo unleashed, prowling the stage, throwing out guitar solos and basically making Coachella his own, large-scale funk party.

“Little Red Corvette” was special, but the most surreal moment of the set was a cover of Radiohead’s “Creep.” Prince made the song his own by switching the lyrics around to call someone else a creep, but the mere fact that Radiohead got the Prince treatment speaks volumes about Coachella, Radiohead and the Purple One himself. Prince also worked in The Beatles’ “Come Together.” Anyone who thought Prince was an odd choice for this festival underestimated both the artist and the festival. By the time “Purple Rain” and “Let’s Go Crazy” dropped, memories were being made all over the place.

Continue reading for Sunday coverage…

Sunday :: 04.27

We left the campground to relax in a salt-water pool in Indio, followed by drinks at the GQ lounge at the Viceroy in Palm Springs, before meeting my buddy at his dad’s McMansion in La Quinta and another pool session. This is the other side of Coachella, and we embraced it for a day. People really drive all the way out to Palm Springs just to be seen or hang out at these parties and houses!

My friends thought we were nuts for trying to get to the festival before the sun went down, but I wanted to catch Stars. I missed ’em, so thank goodness for YouTube. We caught the end of Autolux, which was nice and watched as Gogol Bordello turned the freak knob to 11 and high-jacked the Main Stage the way that gypsy punks tend to do. Gogol Bordello’s set last year was one of the most talked about of the weekend. I’m not sure any other band has gone from a small tent to the Main Stage in a year before. They showed why and then some, absolutely causing pandemonium on the polo fields.

Bob Dylan was playing on the PA – perfect set break music – as I started to move towards My Morning Jacket when Sean Penn walked out onto the stage to a smattering of applause. He was on the schedule for a 15-minute set and we all wondered what he was up to. A short acoustic set perhaps? A jam session with Into the Wild collaborator Eddie Vedder? It turned out to be none of those things, and the start of something even cooler that you’ll read about soon right here on JamBase! In a nutshell, Penn asked for volunteers to ride to New Orleans with him for Jazz Fest to volunteer in the Lower 9th Ward, where people are still picking up their lives after Hurricane Katrina. He said he was leaving Monday morning and would have us back in ten days. All you need to know now is that I got on the bus.

My Morning Jacket only had an hour-long set, and they burned through it with the energy of a headliner. From the opening riff of “One Big Holiday,” the band blew down doors and opened minds. Jim James is a rock-god and he has the boots to prove it. They brought out M. Ward to jam on acoustic guitar for “Off The Record” which raised the energy even further. MMJ’s new stuff sounds as good as the old and we’ll be enjoying these guys for years to come. The only complaint I heard was that it wasn’t long enough. It was exhilarating music to say the least and the Roger Waters’ fans that came early were blown away.

Jack Johnson and Prince had inventive, gorgeous backdrops but Roger Waters had the largest HD screen I’ve ever seen at a concert. I realized that the lights and the sound that seemed so big this year were probably for him. I talked with Paul Tollette from Goldenvoice the next day and he confirmed this. During Waters’ first set, I kept thinking how cool it was that he was headlining Coachella and how all the people there made it possible for Goldenvoice to spend the money to have the best festival venue in America with amazing sound and visuals.

There will always be people clamoring for a Pink Floyd reunion tour, and I wish I could have been at Live 8, too, but seeing Roger Waters in 2008 is better than seeing Floyd in the ’80s because production values have improved so much. I have seen Roger Waters three times in the past decade, including a performance of Dark Side of the Moon, but nothing compared to this show. Things started out on a high note with “Shine on You Crazy Diamond” and never came down.

It was a combination of the location, people, production and set list. Waters performed songs from every Floyd era including a choice “Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun” that featured footage of the original band members on the screen behind him. “Wish You Were Here” was a magical sing-a-long and I wondered if the promoters watched Rodrigo y Gabriela perform the song last year in the Mojave Tent, with the crowd singing every single word and slapped their foreheads, “We should get Roger Waters to play next year!”

Many of the songs had updated video companions. The inflatable Pig was back during “Dogs” and floated away from its tether, true to its message: “Don’t Be Led to Slaughter.” After the first set career retrospective, Set Two was, as advertised, a brilliant reproduction of Dark Side of the Moon with the best sound and lights available, on a scale never before experienced. There simply aren’t many albums that can be played in their entirety. Songs like “Us and Them” are universal anthems for the young and disenfranchised and “Time” will always speak to those who fuck around too much. Dark Side of The Moon is best experienced with friends, and perhaps outside in the desert at Coachella. If that wasn’t enough, “Vera” and “Comfortably Numb” were played as the encores and anyone who hadn’t already shed tears left with wet cheeks. A dream weekend was over and we were left wondering how Coachella would top itself next year.

Of course the festival really wasn’t over, Justice was bumping in the Sahara Tent and we walked over for the after-party. The vibe was still going strong. No one sleeps at Coachella and the song that they were playing summed up the weekend: “We are your friends/ You’ll never be alone again.”

Continue reading for more images from Coachella 2008…

Images by: Dave Vann

Friday :: 04.27

Battles

Architecture in Helsinki

The Breeders

John Butler

Dan Deacon

The National

Tegan and Sara

Jack White – The Raconteurs

Saturday :: 04.28

DeVotchka

Hot Chip

MGMT

Mark Ronson

Rilo Kiley

Portishead

Prince

Sunday :: 04.29

Eugene Hutz – Gogol Bordello

Love and Rockets

Jim James – My Morning Jacket

Carl Broemel – My Morning Jacket

M. Ward and Jim James

Roger Waters

Roger Waters

Roger Waters

Justice

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