that rosebud girl

Coachella 2009 = un-fricking-believable!

My first Coachella is in the books, and I have to say it was one of the best experiences ever. I had such a great time that I think I might have to make this part of my annual concertgoing diet (not to mention my annual budget).

Everything about it was awesome: great music, great times. I’m sore as hell and I have a twisted ankle, but it was well worth it. Even though it was sweltering (especially Sunday), it wasn’t too bad. I expected the heat. Even the camping was a lot of fun (there’s nothing like taking a shower in a portable shower truck).

Friday was by far the best day and made the entire trip worth it. We saw all the best performances that day (and it wasn’t as hot). Not that Saturday and Sunday were snoozers, but I mean, the Molotov-Franz Ferdinand-Paul McCartney combo couldn’t be beat.

The final band tally:

Friday:
We Are Scientists (partial)
Molotov
Franz Ferdinand
Morrissey
Paul McCartney

Saturday:
Henry Rollins (spoken word, no music)
Calexico
TRV$DJ-AM (partial)
M.I.A.
The Killers

Sunday:
Couple of DJ sets (Shepard Fairey, Busy P)
Lupe Fiasco
Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Public Enemy
one Cure song

Man, that’s a crapload of bands and stuff. Edgar was right — Coachella is great because you get to see a lot of bands you probably wouldn’t pay to see by themselves. I would probably not have seen Lupe Fiasco or the Yeah Yeah Yeahs or Public Enemy outside of a festival venue, but I really enjoyed all three performances.

And you wind up seeing a lot of great performances and wanting to get some new music. I might have to go find some Molotov now. And some Lupe Fiasco.

Best performance:

Paul McCartney, hands down! The man is something like 65 years old and still put on an amazing show. And it was two-and-a-half hours! “Blackbird” was done all by himself on an acoustic and was beautiful; he also played “Something in the Way She Moves” with a ukelele and then moved on to using a full band. (His drummer, by the way, was really badass — we kept calling him Warren Sapp.)

My favorite part, though, was when everyone sang along to “Hey Jude.” There’s something insanely cool about tens of thousands of people singing in unison.

Oh, and I forgot how much “Helter Skelter” rocks out. He played it during one of the encores.

Runner-up:

Franz Ferdinand. Funny that I’ve now seen them three times without really intending to see them — they just happened to be on whatever bill I was watching at the time. But they’re excellent live, and every time I see them I think I want to buy more albums.

I was quite amused that the lead singer was wearing a George Harrison t-shirt. And he was good with the crowd.

Things that sucked:

• Twisted ankle! It caused me to miss about half the TRV$DJ-AM set, too. And I couldn’t see Jenny Lewis because I was kind of immobile.
• M.I.A. was okay, but her DJ was really annoying and I wanted him to STFU after a while.
• Poor Morrissey looked like he was going to keel over at some point. He was really struggling through the beginning of his set, though he did recover.
• Glasvegas had to cancel on Saturday, so we didn’t get to see them. (A friend had recommended we see them.)
• Sunday’s heat was awful, and almost everyone was sold out of water. We should have been getting free water at that point.
• I think I have heat rash.

It was very exhausting, but so worth it. I’d definitely do it again!

April 20, 2009 on 11:00 am | Comments Off