Category: Music Festivals

by Max Silver
Indio, Calif.
Filed: 4/16 8:00 p.m.

Finally, the desert of southern California is twisting away from the blazing sun, and a nice coolness is settling in. As night descends, everywhere you turn to look there cellphone lights on, like thousands of futuristic glowing jelly fish floating on the dark and calm sea. The colors of the sky, way off in the distance, fade from wisps of oranges and reds to shades of blue, purple and black.

Overhead, and seemingly closer than the night before, the magnificently bright full moon pours out its milky glow on every surface of the valley, along the edges of the sloping camel back mountains and against the towering palm trees, like ancient pillars to the gods.

Night time is falling on this the second day of the music mecca known as Coachella. Tens of thousands of people sleeping under the stars by night, and dancing, eating, drinking and listening to music by day. The majestic Ferris wheel off in the distance gets brighter as the long expanse of the heavens above turn darker, a much welcomed relief from the searing sun. 

The sounds of electric, wood, and wind sail over this massive configuration of people, stages, vendors, skyward artworks, and palms. The air changes from odors of pizza and BBQ chicken to cannabis and incense.

The experience of being at a music festival in the middle of the desert, at the mercy of the sun by day, but under the Milky Way by night, is thankfully not a once-in-a-lifetime event. (continued at end of page)

On the main stage, Broken Social Scene were on earlier, and now Bright Eyes is rocking the masses. Coming up are Animal Collective, Mumford & Sons and Arcade Fire.  That’s a pretty sweet chunk of time featuring an A-list of indie bands, gratefully, all from the same stage. So, in celebration of Coachella, this Sunday’s S-25 Mix is dedicated to the bands, fans, and crew that make Coachella a blast to last.

“Shell Games” – Bright Eyes from The People’s Key (2011)

“Taken For A Fool” – The Strokes from Angles (2011)

“My Girls” – Animal Collective from Merriweather Post Pavilion (2009)

“Black Gold” – Foals from Total Life Forever (2010)

“Tighten Up” – The Black Keys from Brothers (2010)

“Sprawl II” – Arcade Fire from The Suburbs (2010)

“Afraid of Everyone” – The National from High Violet (2010)

“Your Hands Together” – New Pornographers from Together (2010)

“Do You Want It All?” – Two Door Cinema Club from Tourist History (2010)

“Obstacle” – Interpol from Turn On The Bright Lights (2002)

“Never Follow Suit” – The Radio Dept from Clinging to a Scheme (2010)

“Round and Round” – Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti from Before Today (2010)

“Lover’s Spit” – Broken Social Scene from The Reminder EP (2008)

“Not In Love” (with Robert Smith) – Crystal Castles from Crystal Castles II (2010)

“You Know What I Mean” – Cults from 7″ single (2010)

“Ex-Factor” – Lauren Hill from The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill (1998)

“Stay Close” – Delorean from Subiza (2010)

“Around My Head” – Cage the Elephant from Thank You Happy Birthday

“Bushwick Blues” – Delta Spirit from History from Below (2010)

“Frank, AB” – The Rural Alberta Advantage from Hometowns (2008)

“Santa Ana Winds” – Cold War Kids from Behave Yourself (2010)

“A Place We Like”- Twin Shadow vs. Hooray for the Earth

“Four Score and Seven (Part One)” – Titus Andronicus from The Monitor (2010)

“Take Me Over” – Cut Copy from Zonoscope (2010)

“Undertow” – Warpaint from The Fool (2010)

“Helena Beat” – Foster The People from Torches – out May 24th

“Can’t Tell Me Nothing” – Francis and the Lights from Guilt By Association, Vol. 2 (2008)

“Great Pan Is Dead” – Cold Cave from Cherish the Light Years (Bonus Track)

The Coachella Experience

In a few hours, the last day of Coachella will have arrived. It’s always strange how fast it all goes by, but it’s always a blast. For so many people, there’s the sense of dread when late Sunday afternoon rolls around. It means the last few hours of Coachella for another year.  We will all go back from sharing this amazing experience to our regular lives

Coachella is, for some people, the ultimate experience, even a religious experience, not simply for all of the great music, but also because is shows that, for the most part, tens of thousands of different people from different lives, places and backgrounds, can come together and celebrate a common love for music and good times, to get along and respect one another, way out in the middle of the desert, detached from the ‘real world’ for a few days. Sure, it sounds really cheesy, but I think it’s what a lot of people love about Coachella.

You’ve really got to give it to all the folks that make Coachella such an awesome experience each year. And year after year, it gets better as the organizers and crews, security and operations people learn, tweak, evolve, and improve. Just for a logistical stand-point, it’s an enormous undertaking.

The one thing that we hear the most is how great the music sounds. That’s for sure – the folks that set up and manage the sound systems at Coachella are the best in the outdoor sound arena. Sure there have been glitches and imperfections, but it’s amazing to see how far music festivals like Coachella have come in the area of sound quality over the past decade.

But ultimately, it’s the bands and the fans that make the whole thing possible.  And if you think about it, live performances are really the one leg of the “music industry” that remains firmly intact. You just can’t enjoy a concert or a festival sitting on your ass streaming it on YouTube.