This year, 2022, may be remembered, among other things, as the year in which the shows, performances, and festivals that the whole world had been deprived of for about two years finally saw the light of day again. In some cases, more light than in others, I would say.
At the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival , or simply Coachella, which always takes place in the city of Indio, in the Colorado desert of California, United States, daylight is not scarce, quite the opposite. Sunscreen, hats, and sunglasses are essential items in the luggage of anyone venturing there. Aware of this, our intrepid two-person team, consisting of this writer and his brother and creative partner, fresh from covering the South by Southwest Festival, headed to the west coast of the United States for this other adventure, and here is an attempt at a concise report of the experience.
It's Friday, April 22, 2022. We just dropped our things off in the trailer we rented to be our home for three days in the Colorado desert, hopped on the bicycles with baskets and pedal brakes that we rented for transportation, and now we're on our way to the Festival, which is starting its second weekend of activities. We'll be late compared to what we planned because the car we got two seats in from Los Angeles took considerably longer to pick us up and then broke down again when we had to go through the process of retrieving our credentials. Our driver, Molly (and there's no hidden message about ecstasy here, which people also call Molly, that was her real name), well, our driver seemed nice and gave us a good price, but she made a few mistakes that delayed us. Without going into too much detail, at one point we thought Molly had stolen our things, and when we found out that wasn't the case, we were even happy to see her again and ended up forgiving the delays.
Well, our route from the trailer to the Empire Polo Club, the official home of Coachella, is about five kilometers, but we cycled at least two more because we were unfamiliar with the area and didn't find much signage. Shoulders, bike lanes, and, as we would later see, streetlights, aren't exactly strong points of the city of Indio either, which is quite frustrating, especially if you were influenced by Coachella's "be environmentally friendly, use fewer cars" message and decided to do your part by cycling to the event. I mean, if you're going to ask people to be environmentally friendly, then you, the event, should be more environmentally friendly. I don't know if I would repeat the somewhat dangerous bicycle adventure in a future edition.
I think it's stating the obvious to say that at events of Coachella's magnitude and with the number of attractions, it's impossible to see everything. Nine stages, the two largest being outdoors, and five smaller, covered ones, all named after major deserts (Gobi, Sahara, Mojave, Sonora, and Yuma), plus two extra tents, and each stage with an average of about ten acts per day. If you manage to see 15 out of every show, you can consider it a very good experience. But of course, the goal isn't quantity, so you choose what you want to see and devise a strategy to make the most of your time, seeing the shows that interest you most but also wandering around the space, checking out the art installations, taking photos of things and in front of things (especially if you spent time putting together a special look for the occasion), people-watching, and letting the whole experience wash over you.
In our case, we already had a few shows scheduled to try and see, either because of their relevance to our coverage or for ourselves personally. The first one we actually managed to check out ended up being the show by Brazilian artist Anitta, who, like the show the previous week, absolutely killed it. Snoop Dogg there live like in the first week, but I watched the broadcast from the previous week and got the impression that this Monday's show was even more polished. It might be the excitement of being "live" talking, it's true. I was also struck by the heterogeneity of the audience. The show was on the main stage, so naturally we would see all kinds of people there, people who came to see Anitta and people who don't even know who she is, but for some reason I thought I would run into even more Brazilians. I think this only confirms the increasingly international character of the artist.
From that first day, I was still very happy to see the fury of the British-Irish band IDLES and the psychedelic noise of the Australians King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard , who were on my list, but the ones who really won my heart were the Australians Amyl and the Sniffers. The vocalist Amy Taylor, in particular, is pure charisma and dominates the stage and the crowd, who feel more than comfortable going up there with her and dancing or just diving back into the audience. Incidentally, when Amy decided to surf the crowd backwards, I had the honor of being part of the wave that pushed her back onto the stage to continue the fun for the people. The bigger shows on the main stage have incredible productions and the image on the giant screens has reached an absurd level of cinematic quality, but the proximity that the experience of watching shows on smaller stages provides is also something unique.
On Saturday the 23rd, feeling a bit more adventurous on the bike trails but also tired from the previous day, having slept little and with a certain amount of desert dust accumulated in our lungs, we managed to enjoy, while it was still daylight, the velvety voice and soulful melodies of Arlo Parks , a little of the cheerful energy of the Japanese Breakfast group , and, on behalf of my daughter, who is Korean at heart, check out the precise choreography of the pop phenomenon from the Aespa girls on the main stage. Later that night, starting at 8:25 pm, Pablo Vittar and his team took to the Gobi stage punctually (punctuality, by the way, is a constant at the festival) , guaranteeing a show full of energy and a dedicated audience. Unlike Anitta's show, my impression of Pablo's audience was that it was a slightly less heterogeneous crowd, with many people singing in Portuguese and several incredible costume productions (which, to stand out in the middle of Coachella, where many people already come with very flashy productions, is already an achievement in itself). The night ended with Billie Eilish 's show , which, in addition to the spectacle itself—music, dance, video, Billie walking over the crowd on a robotic arm and that sort of thing—also featured the historic participation of Hayley Williams from Paramore . This show would be our biggest experience of a large audience with the same vibe, so to speak. Very impressive.
But for me personally, the most memorable moment of the night was the show by the multi-talented Danny Elfman , who has an exceptional career producing themes and soundtracks for film, but who also had his time as a pop star decades ago, leading the rock band Oingo Boingo . Returning to the stage as a performer after more than 30 years, Elfman put together a show with a little bit of everything, using a rock band, choir, and orchestra (conducted by Oingo Boingo's original guitarist, Steve Bartek ) to get his message across. New songs, Oingo Boingo hits, and renditions of the most classic themes he composed for film, which, just to illustrate, include the theme from The Simpsons , Sam Raimi 's Spider-Man , and all of Tim Burton 's best works , including his 1989 Batman ! A turbocharged and schizophrenic (in a good way) show, just like Elfman himself, who at 68 years old sang, acted, took off his shirt and jumped around, like any younger colleague, but with a much higher quality and considerably more extensive repertoire than any of the other artists at this year's Coachella.
By the third day, my eyes were already burning considerably from the accumulation of desert dust, and my partner had caught the famous "Coachella cough," which I must have escaped because I kept my bandana over my nose and mouth. My legs and back ached more than on the second day, but the fact that this was the last day gave us an extra boost, and off we went, pedaling to the final stage of the festival.
If there was one day that summed up the international character of the festival for us, it was the third. Our schedule included Viagra Boysfrom Sweden, South African Orville Peck, the Italian band Maneskin , and Nathy Peluso from Argentina, among others. The most fun part for me was the first of these shows we saw, Viagra Boys, which guaranteed us the same kind of experience that Amyl and the Sniffers brought. A fun show, without ceasing to be powerful, and a charismatic vocalist who, in this case, instead of the sexy fury of Amy Taylor, came in the unique form of Sebastian Murphy with his bare torso, belly, and tattoos, sunglasses, and drunken uncle dance moves. An island of "ordinary people" in a sea of mega-productions and fit people from show business in general. A good dose of mosh pit and people crowd surfing at this show too. I would easily go to another Viagra Boys performance. After them we saw Orville Peck, who ended up being a little overshadowed in my eyes because we started the day very early with the Viagra Boys. Anyway, Peck's country music is quite charming, with a dose of bizarreness that brings a certain freshness to the style. The fact that Orville Peck always wears a fringed mask over his face is part of the strangeness of his show, and coincidentally it matches very well with the look of a good portion of the female Coachella audience who opted for cowboy hats and fringes everywhere to put together their outfits this year.
Regarding Maneskin, although many people arrived at the Mojave stage knowing only their cover of the Four Seasons' hit "Beggin'", it's quite likely the band left with a whole new wave of fans because the Italians' show is pure energy wrapped in the best rock 'n' roll performance clichés. Nathy Peluso, on the other hand, is a completely different animal. In her own way, she's also pure energy, but a very feminine and powerful energy. A dancer, she's constantly moving and seducing, while simultaneously asserting herself and intimidating with her strong woman attitude. From her band, percussion, horn section, and electronic beats complete a blend of Latin flavor without ceasing to be modern and international.
If you've made it this far in the text, you've already realized that I've failed miserably in my attempt to give a concise account of my Coachella experience. Don't blame me too much, dear reader. It was three intense days, packed with many incredible things, others not so much, and some even unpleasant. It's quite complicated to summarize these things to the point of giving due importance to everything that was seen, heard, and experienced. This was just one of many possible experiences. I'm sure that electronic music fans would have completely different accounts to give here. Similarly, those who went to the festival as a couple must have had an incredible experience too. There were many places there to spread out a blanket and lie down with your sweetheart and wait for the next show. On the other hand, this is not a cheap festival, especially if you earn in reais, spend in dollars, and are going to spend the whole day inside this area where a can of Heineken costs the equivalent of more than 60 reais. Reflecting a little now, perhaps this is one of the reasons why I didn't see many people drunk or out of the house, so to speak. Which is good in one sense, but also kind of boring. Everything always has at least two sides, and it's no different here.
At first glance, for example, I saw many, many people less interested in the music itself than in showing off and documenting their looks in front of the colorful structures and beautiful palm trees of the Colorado desert, to show the world they were there. But I also saw many people with non-standard body types, happy and overly proud to display their shapes adorned with looks that were sometimes very creative, sometimes quite bizarre, but always with a lot of skin on display, and no one was judging or pointing out this or that oddball. In the professional sphere, I found the attention given to the press in general to be quite insignificant, bordering on disrespect. From confusing communication via several different email addresses before the start of the festival and long delays in answering simple questions, to the rather meager press tent and the somewhat anti-free press policy of not allowing cameras and professional equipment at the event (except for the venue's partner professionals), to the sheer lack of communication and availability of images after the event. And the worst part is that events like Coachella set the standard for many others around the world, which means that soon a lot of festivals may be following this silly pattern as well.
Epilogue: Our last bike ride to the trailer, with our lungs and faces full of dust, was the most exhausting. My rear tire punctured on the final stretch, and I had to push the bike. We slept for about two hours, and Molly came to pick us up to go back to Los Angeles. We couldn't sleep much in the car because it was full, and the fact that someone in a seat further ahead was watching The Batman on their phone (I recognized the dialogue because I'd already seen the movie) without headphones didn't help much. After almost three hours of driving, imagine my surprise when, arriving in the City of Angels, I realized that the person "watching" the Robert Pattinson was none other than our own driver, Molly, with her phone conveniently resting on the dashboard in front of her. Despite the danger, we survived and even had a great day that included a hike to the top of the Hollywood sign and our first swim in the Pacific Ocean. Every bad experience will have a good one to counterbalance it, and thankfully, this one was no different.
