As a Coachella virgin, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect.  “100,000 people,” I was told.  “Frigging hot,” I was cautioned.  “Hipsterfest 2010,” someone declared.

While these tidbits would be enough to put any sane person totally off the idea, the warnings worked like an aphrodisiac.  I began to lust over the madness.  ‘Yes!’, I thought.  ‘Throw me in amongst the ridiculous fray. Let’s experience this in all its frenzied glory.’

Famous last words.

As I sit writing this, at a resort in Palm Springs, with pre-noon temperatures idling around 85°, memories from yesterday race through my head.  A fusion of delight & debauchery, there was pulchritude & barbarity in equal measure.  Girls in thong bikinis with sunburned bottoms & enormous dragonflies swooping & diving.  More free liquor than anyone could possibly want, & my editor Barbie brandishing a bottle of Finlandia with blood-curdling triumph.  Senior citizens lounging by the pool, arms covered in wristbands & Rumer Willis dancing on the Red Bull bus to David Guetta’s Sexy Bitch.  Serene one-person teepees & stinky bogs & maniacs on motorbikes.  A bar called Cougars with three middle-aged women walking in the door, & more pairs of denim shorts than you possibly thought could be manufactured.

What is this place?  This lush green oasis in the middle of nothingness, flanked by palatial purple mountains?  This place where people come to play tennis & see bands & sizzle in the sun?  There are hot pink blossoms from a flowering tree falling on my head & to my right, a popcorn machine emits that famous buttery smell.  In the words of David After Dentist, <www.youtube.com/watch?v=txqiwrbYGrs> “Is this real life?”

This afternoon we head back into the fracas, to see what can be seen.  How can you document this kind of melee?  Is it really possible to interact with drunken, affluent savages?  What can be gleaned from these feral sophisticates?  What foul wounds will we nurse all the way back to the East Coast, the land of the stable?

Please cross your fingers with purpose, sing Gaelic blessings under your breath, wish on stars on our behalf.  It has only been one day so far.

Words by Gala Darling with photos by Seth Johnson

So I don’t mean to get all hocus pocus on your ass, but bad things happen when you travel during Mercury retrograde.  Life just goes awry.  In a big way.  From misscommunications to missed flights, it is a time when ideally you should lay low, revise or edit old projects, & generally not be too ambitious.  But hey!  We’re brave!  We care not for astrology!  WE ARE CHINASHOP!  We’ll give anything a try!  & so, on Saturday morning, Barbie (our editor & multi-tasking prodigy), Seth (taciturn & phenomenally gifted videographer & photographer) & I (insert your own adjectives & nouns here) set off towards the desert in a blue Nissan Altima hybrid.

Okay, maybe that introduction was a little more dramatic than it needed to be, but simply put, we ventured out to the desert to go to a music festival which, it turned out, none of us had tickets for.  Slight hitch.  Not to mention, it was completely sold out.  There were no tickets to be had.  Nada.  Nunca.

You see, this is the thing about being a creative for hire.  No matter the circumstances, you have to whip something up.  I went out there in search of some kind of arid love story, & Seth was quietly grasping this magnificent Leica video camera envisioning glorious vistas, & Barbie had her eyes on the horizon probably thinking about what she could do to stop me from asking incessant questions.

We dropped our suitcases at our hotel (like a fabulous but terrible phantasm of the 1970s, all done in lime green & tropical prints) before hitting the road again to go in search of The Story.

So, what do people do at Coachella when they can’t actually get into Coachella?  We were certainly not the only ones in this situation.  Well, I’ll tell you: they drink.  Copiously.  They throw frisbees.  They eyeball one another from behind identical pairs of Wayfarers.  They wear sequinned dresses to In-N-Out Burger.  (Oh, wait, that was just me.)  We wandered through campsites & drove along roads which stretched out into the nothingness & clambered around mountains at sunrise.

As the weekend wore on, things improved.  While previously the idea of being cockblocked from Coachella had us all grimacing & gritting our teeth, by Sunday afternoon I think we were all filled with a sense of relief.  It really wasn’t all bad.  There had been French toast with bacon for breakfast & plenty of frozen coffee drinks.  There were aquamarine swimming pools & incredible views.  We had danced on the Red Bull bus, scaled waterfalls to grab bottles of vodka (oh, again, that was just me), & eaten incredible steaks at (www.bingcrosbysrestaurant.com) Bing Crosby’s Restaraunt and Piano Lounge (you should go).

& then we realized: we had not been subjected to pressing crowds of 100,000+ hipsters!  We had avoided overzealous rent-a-cops!  We had not stood in lines for hours upon end just to get through a gate!  We had not been deafened by Infected Mushroom, & no one had been vomited on!

If you ask me, it couldn’t have been a more successful trip!

Words by Gala Darling with photos by Seth Johnson

 

The first night of Coachella was a bit of a mess… after 7 hours of traffic I got to the Festival a little late, and switched arrangements to see The Dillinger Escape Plan with, well, pretty much whomever I could find. Thus commenced a great deal of scrambling around and looking for weird sheize to frolic in. Having never been to the big C before, I stumbled around in the dark near what I would later learn is the ‘Outdoor stage’ and found myself in a land beyond sight and sound. I had passed the main stages and DJ tents. I’d reached: The Dolab.

This was a step or two above normal raver/festival-goer territory. It was someplace that looked like a cross between the Hobbit village Rivendell, and a Frank Lloyd Wright architecture exhibit. If you’ve never been to/heard of the DoLab, what you’re missing is an L.A.-based collective of performance artists, dancers, and musicians gathered beneath a bizarre collection of sculptures and architecture.

Fans and artists were on hand to spray you down, should the heat come on a little too strong. Beside some of the sculptures were cozy beds with pristine and soon-to-be-ruined white sheets. There I witnessed a pretty spectacular show, with great art, great music by a great DJ named Kraddy. It was refreshing not to have to deal with the usual techno and rave stuff; Kraddy’s set was a beast of both harder electronica noise and frantic guitar samples (industrial, remember that stuff?!). It didn’t hurt to have lots of pretty people dancing around wearing next to nothing, either. 

Words by Jeff Nau, Photos by JP Croswhite and Aaaron Gautchi

Today’s bloggin best…

- Outkast’s Big Boi finally sets a release date for Sir Lucious Left Foot. NME

- Finally some real Daft Punk movie music. Prefix

- The xx remixes Yacht. DFA Records

- Sophia Coppola baby daddy to score her new film (it’s Thomas from Phoenix). Pitchfork

- Steve Jobs really hates pr0n. Sends perverts to Google. Wired

-Legendary MC Guru passes away. MTV

- B.O.B. hangs with Jay Electronica. 2DopeBoyz

- Behind-the-Scenes with Plastikman at Coachella. URB

I don’t know why I still like Johnny Rotten. In the Sex Pistols and early days of Public Image Limited he seemed more of a red herring, go-for-broke sort of chap, always teetering on the fine line somewhere between indulging and impatient. A few of his longtime fans might feel that the guy has recently become soft in his old age. (Or maybe they’ve gone that route as well.) Perhaps it’s that vegetarianism or just a decision to be kinder and more endearing Rotten, sort of a funnily-cynical curmudgeon, always outspoken but perhaps not as mean-spirited in his outbursts. The first comparison that comes to mind is how Borscht Belt comedian Milton Berle was so ahead of his time years ago but ended up exchanging one-liners and punchlines with Muppets on Sesame Street. Rotten didn’t seem too too far off from that last part Friday evening. But he still proved he could deliver a great set, not give a shit if we liked it or not, and have the crowd eating out of his hand.

Part of the reason you love have to love him is because he’s not afraid to fuck with you, that before he’s a singer he’s a showman, and he loves the schadenfreude. It was a bit of a relief to see the old smart-ass back, and keeping his particularly loyal subjects hungry for more. Tonight he took a few jabs at Jay-Z, who was easily drowned out in the poppy, post-punk noise of PiL, the corporation/band/outfit he began following Sid Vicious’ death and the subsequent albeit temporary break-up of his Pistols.

While they could easily fit into the decade that birthed them in a neon fluorescent totally rad pile of placenta, tonight even up against Billboard’s latest and greatest his band was a conglomerate of excellent musicians that all managed to bring loads of different influences aboard. His songs aren’t so much traditional verse/chorus/verse ditties as  proggy, stream-of-consciousness banter like “Rise”. Of course he opened with “This is Not a Love Song”, still one of his very best and one that’s still as loud and rocking as ever. With his intangible knack for making clever music seem simple (or maybe vice versa), it’s that combination of dubstep Reggae basslines and syncopated, prog-rock guitar with lots of nifty pedals — that all makes for a sort of odd selection in arms for combating the kids next door.

It’s his flamboyance, the fact that he never grew up, or maybe that he never had a chance to. Purely out of fond reflection, I put together some clips of his better moments with music journalists and media, just in anticipation of getting to meet the guy, which unfortunately never quite happened (perhaps for the best). Ever get the feeling someone doesn’t give a sh*t? Again, it’s why you have to love Johnny Rotten…

Words by Jeff Nau, Photos by JP Croswhite

Coachella might be known as one of the world’s finest rock festivals, but since it’s inception all the way back in 1999, the event’s promoters put as much focus on LA rave culture as they did catering to the alternative nation (now called the indie rock masses). From Daft Punk to Kraftwerk, many of Coachella’s greatest moments over the years have come from electronic music titans. Here’s a collection of sets from artists playing this year’s festival. The perfect collection of beats to get you warmed up for the desert.

Major Lazer – Coachella is a sort of hometown gig for Baltimore and London natives Diplo and Switch, both of whom rellocated to Los Angeles in recent years. Last years Major Lazer release party found Spank Rock, Amanda Blank, Santigold and Andy Milonakis on the mic—and that was just a private party. Imagine what favors they might call in for their Coachella spectacular.

Aeroplane – This Belgian duo have been almost single-handedly responsible for bringing the word balearic back into dance music’s vocabulary, with breezy remixes of fellow Coachella performers MGMT, as well as Grace Jones (who mysteriously disappeared off of this years line-up).

The XX – This UK three-piece (formerly a foursome) have created huge waves with their gentle melanchloy sound. Find out what selections they chose for their Headphone Highlights session.

LCD Soundsystem – When not providing the vox and drums for LCD Soundsystem’s headlining performances worldwide, James Murphy and Pat Mahoney are two globe-trotting wax masters who’s Special Disco Version parties intorudced a whole new generation of hipsters to the wonders of vintage disco hits, played on vinyl rather than laptop.

Flying Lotus – One of this years most anticipated performers, the nephew of the infamous Alice Coltrane is putting Los Angeles on the map when it comes to mind-bending experimental electronic music. Even Thom Yorke has taken notice, bring FlyLo out to open on all of his Atoms For Peace U.S. tour dates.

DJ Craze & Klever – On their own, DJCraze and Klever are two championship winning turntablists who have wowed crowds for over a decade. Together, the present a dueling DJ party performance like no other.

Passion Pit - More rockers who are unafraid to take to the turntables when the afterhours calls, Passion Pit pony up DJ Shadow, Friendly Fires and Ace of Base (!?) in this special Headphone Highlights session.

Hot Chip – The last time Hot Chip played Coachella in 2007, their mid-afternoon set in the Sahara tent was so packed that the heat made their vintage analog keyboards malfunction in weird and wonderful ways. All five memeber have thriving DJ careers when between Hot Chip tours, which keeps their selection skills unparallelled.

Club 75 – Ever since Daft Punks dominant 2006 Coachella performance, no Coachella has been complete without a healthy helping of French dance dons. This years installment comes in the form of Club 75, the new all-star DJ unit featuring Coachella vets Justice, Busy P and DJ Mehdi, plus french house legends Cassius.

Plastikman – The most infamous production handle of techno superstar Richie Hawtin, this live performance pushes the barriers of audience participation with an interacitve iPhone app among other technological breakthroughs. Check out this Fire Side chat for a taste of Hawtin’s minimalist vision of electronic music.

Rusko – Another SoCal immigrant, Rusko now leads the global dubstep invasion, taking the London sound and applying it to LA radio, new tunes by M.I.A. and now the fields of Coachella.

When environmental education group Global Inheritance began their partnership with Coachella in 2004, the idea was a simple as having a bunch of artist apply paint to garbage cans in an effort to encourage recycling while helping to keep the concert grounds debris free. Seven years on, and GI’s efforts at the annual music festival have become some of the weekend’s most talked about activities. Whether it’s exchanging 10 empty water bottles for one full one, or peddling a bicycle to recharge your cell phone, Global Inheritance doesn’t just educate and amuse a few concert goers, it finds a way of making the event better for everyone, even if they never step foot out of the VIP area.

This year, Global Inheritance has come up with their most interactive concept yet. Building on the idea of human power, the group has put together the Sweatshop DJ initiative—a human powered DJ set-up that allows ambitious jocks to take to the decks in the desert, so long as they can bring enough friends to fuel the sound system via their own pedal power. It takes a lot of human movement to keep the juice flowing—12 friends in all, turning cranks, pedaling bikes and running on a gigantic hamster wheel. But the opportunity to rock even a passing crowd at Coachella is too great of an opportunity for amateur DJs to pass up.

“We want to inspire people to rethink the way we look at energy consumption,” explains Global Inheritance founder Eric Ritz, while declining to tell us what music he personally prefers. “It doesn’t matter,” he insists. “I support all shapes and sizes.”

Learn how to be a Sweatshop DJ at globalinheritance.org

During Coachella 09, the french electro artists from Ed Banger Records (Justice, Busy P, So Me, Medhi, Fafi, Gaspard, Sebastian, Kavinsky, etc) descended upon LA with their new clothing brand, Cool Cats, first ever pop up store in the US at De La Barracuda on Melrose in Mid City. On Monday, April 20th, 2009 A.C. (After Coachella), the social chameleons of the LA scene journeyed through the heavily trafficked LA arteries to an afternoon of relaxation in fashion and friendship with drinks provided by Red Bull, Belvedere IX and Colt 45s, and the side act of guest DJ sets from Medhi, So Me, , Sebastian, and Busy P (On his Birthday!) From the fashion side, limited edition presses of their apparel were on sale to grab up for all the trend setters to take back to their boroughs of the city and dawn on Tuesday. Surprise surprise: appearances from Guy Manuel of Daft Punk, Digitalism, Artist Darren Romanelli, Editor Jamie O’Shea, Photographer Lionel DeLuy (who for the fun of it, set up a photo booth for the day) and more. The result, a celebration of french music and fashion in LA. A good time had by all…

Some Cool Blog Recaps:
http://barracudashop.com/blog/?m=200904 (Halfway down the page)
http://youtellconcerts.com/?p=323
http://migueld.thelechuga.com/2009/04/23/cool-cats-barracuda/
http://www.findinternettv.com/Video,item,167620017.aspx
http://trashageyo.blogspot.com/2009/04/cool-cats-pop-up-store.html

Words by Josh Greenberg, Photos by Zoetica Ebb

 

 

You may think to be truly punk rock you have to hail from London or New York? But you might be surprised if I told you that Oslo Norway was were it’s actually happening!

Turbonegro has been living the punk rock drama for the past 20 years. When speaking with Happy Tom this weekend I likened them to the Andy Warhol’s of the punk rock scene. He wasn’t especially impressed with my comparison. He said,”That’s terrible, didn’t he get shot”. But my point, and I did have one, was that Warhol really paid attention to popular culture, took the opinion and vices of the day and served it right back to the Richies all the while mocking their moral high ground. In essence Turbonegro has been paying attention to the most ridiculous trends in rock culture and then serving it right back to the world, only suped up, fast, hard, and totally rock.  As Happy Tom says, “We started off as a parody, and ended up a revolution”.

Sitting outside Turbo’s trailer at Coachella I had a lovely conversation with singer Hank Von Helvete and Happy Tom. Speaking of their origins in the very small and very cold city of Oslo. Hank painted a lovely picture of how all they do all day is lay about like centerfold models on Polar Bear rugs sipping wine in their tighty whities. And you know, I could kind of see that being true, they are just twisted enough to live like that, laughing all the while. With a band named to evoke, “a large, well-equipped, armed, black male in a fast car out for vengence” how could you not laugh too. The music they make may be some of the most honest rock n roll out there today. Their last release in 2007, Retox is no exception. Nevermind the sailor suit and the cape, these guys aren’t afraid to express themselves thats for damn sure.

They had been asked to play the Coachella festival 4 times over the past decade but for various reasons they weren’t able to indulge until now. Mostly they were excited to see some of the other bands on the bill, especially Mastodon, who they have a fondness for like proud pappas.

Turbonegro – All My Friends Are Dead

If you missed Turbonegro in Indio California, then you really missed them. They are heading home for some European festivals and then doing what they do best…returning to the bear skin rug. Alas, punk is not dead!

Words by Barbie Brady, Photos by Fever Dragon

 

Band of Horses played this years Coachella. Their runaway hit The Funeral has an emo vibe that one would assume might make them a good fit for the alt rock lineup. Clearly the thousands of people paying rapt attention to them at the show made me re-think my initial impression…which was “what is this southern rock band doing playing Coachella”? But you know, that’s just me.

Words by Barbie Brady, photos by Fever Dragon