Being the avid concert and festival goer that I am, I was surprised to find that I barely made it through the first day of Coachella in one piece. I spent the majority of the day at Coachella Stage because that’s where Bjork was playing—she was why I drove the 11 hours to Coachella Valley. I managed to get to the front by the time the Silversun Pickups took the stage. They played an amazing set and I thought, “Hey, this is easier than I thought it was going to be!” By the time Arctic Monkeys came on to play, I realized that I couldn’t have been more wrong. Why it took a band like them to turn a once mellow, happy crowd into a hostile one I will never know. Being surrounded by thousands of sweaty people for eight hours is never pleasant, but being surrounded by thousands of sweaty, pushy, mean people squishing you into the people infront of you, jabbing various limbs into your body and having people crowd-surfed unconscious over your head is more than I could take. After putting up with it for several hours, I came to the realization that it wasn’t going to get any better and finally had to have a security guard literally pull me out of the crowd, because there was no way you could push out of it. Never in my life have I experienced a crowd that hostile, especially for a musician like Bjork. (I would hate to be in the crowd for Rage Against the Machine on the last day.)Regardless, the bands I saw played great sets (Silversun Pickups, Bjork, Interpol, Arctic Monkeys, Satellite Party, and Jesus and Mary Chain) and the trip was definately worth it, but I think I’ll just stick to Austin City Limits.
Coachella Remixed
2 min read
... and roll.
Hillari Straba
