Coachella 2010 Day Three 04-18-10

Coachella Day 3 04-18-10

Saturday we got-up, cleaned-up, filed our respective Coachella reports, and packed our bags. We were down by the car at about 11:00am and ready to go to Denny’s for breakfast…

…uh, no car key.

My iPhone had fallen through my left pocket the night before during Muse’s set; I had a new hole in some old shorts. That night we came home at 3am. I was stone-cold sober (only one beer the entire weekend) but tired, surely the key had fallen through the same hole.

It was not in the hotel. It was not on the ground near the car. It was not at the front desk. I checked my bags six times. I emptied my backpack, which I would have had with me, twice. Nowhere to be found.

My roommate ended-up taking an $80 cab ride. I had to cancel an assignment. I called AAA. “Ninety minutes”.

Ninety minutes (1:00pm) and the guy comes. “Oh, your Cruiser has a transponder key. I’ll make the key, but the other guy will have to come and program it. He’ll be here in half an hour.”

At 2:00pm, I call AAA again. “Uh, where is he?”

“We’ll call you back.”

They call in 15 minutes. “Fifteen minutes.”

HE calls in 15 minutes. “Another half-hour”.

All those times are estimates. The guy had been at the polo fields and kept getting new calls down there, where he was already located. Point is that I wasn't driving towards Indio until about 4pm. I had to park a mile away. I was not on the festival grounds until after 5pm.

So between the first day and this one, I missed something like eight hours of the festival. I never miss an hour, if I can help it. Because I missed a lot of morning hours, I lost-out on a chance to discover new music. It felts very much like when the Indy 500 rains-out mid-race.



A chicken sandwich was in my mouth right as Yo La Tengo started-up. You can read my review of Yo La Tengo’s set on BuzzBands.la

Other Thoughts on Yo La Tengo:

• YLT has been on my to-do list for a decade. I liked “Pass the Hatchet, I Think I’m Goodkind” enough to buy the record. (Gil Scott-Heron and more Pavement were the other post-fest purchases.)
  
  
• If I were making a film about Yo La Tengo’s early years, I’d cast Duke Clark as James McNew.
  

• Georgia Hubley. Gotta be pushing 50. Yes I would.

You can read my review of Spoon’s set on BuzzBands.la

Other Thoughts on Spoon:

• I still feel that Spoon is always a half-step from being a mid-90’s pop rock band like Fastball. But that show went a long way in making me think twice.
  
  
• Bradford Cox (Atlas Sound / Deer Hunter) and Stephen Patterson (White Rabbits) joined Spoon toward the end of the set for a few songs.

Pavement.

Whooooooo, Pavement.

I didn’t listen to Pavement in middle or high school (should have), and disregarded them in college (shouldn’t have). They were pitched to me as “sounds kinda like Weezer,” and when they didn’t sound like Weezer beyond a few guitar tones and background vocals, I moved along. The timing was bad, I was getting out of my non-commercial hip-hop phase and hadn’t rediscovered my 90’s childhood identity just yet.

It wasn’t until a couple years ago I gave ‘em another go and got it. So I’m not gonna tell you how important they are to music. I won’t prosthetize, or anything like that. I’ll say that Superchunk, Pavement, and Archers of Loaf (late-comer to that band, too) make music that connects to me -- music that sounds like how I remember my formative years -- and chances to see those kinds of bands are pretty slim ‘round these times.

I had to be at the main stage for Yo La Tengo. I found Travis Woods four rows back for Spoon, who I also had to cover. I was four rows from the stage a half-hour before Pavement was about to play. My plan was to enjoy them from afar. I couldn’t exactly pass the chance though, you know?

Ten minutes before the set, four or so little gremlins start working their way up behind us. “I have to get to the front row!” one said to his friends. “Not a chance!” I hollered directly toward the stage.

They plotted to burst forth. Mr. Woods and I held our ground. Uncharacteristic of me, I turned around to one and said “You know, all these people have been waiting for three sets to get there.” They backed off.

Sometime during “In the Mouth of the Desert,” (early in the set) I felt bad for being a dick to those kids. They could not have been eighteen yet. By all rights, they should have been at the fest for Phoenix or Major Lazer or some godawful shit. But they were geeky-looking guys, like me when I was their age, and they were carrying the dying torch of indie rock. I grew to like them.

During “Unfair” (second to last song) some meat-pylon came charging through. Presumably a Gorillaz fan, he wasn’t slyly sneaking by. He was forcing his way up. I saw him shove one of the kids behind me. I got pissed. Those kids were trying to enjoy the show. It was Unfair!

I’d missed half the fest that day. I’d already had a drunken couple sneak in front of me, crowding my space. I wasn’t about to let this guy go. I stopped him. Shouted “ARE YOU TRYING TO GET OUT?” (there’s a barrier for easy exit in case someone passes-out or gets sick) When he said “No!” – now this is not like me at all – I screamed “THEN GET THE FUCK BACK.” And shoved him five feet.

This happened to be during the loud part of “Unfair,” and the crowd was jumping like crazy anyway. There was a lot of shoving and pushing. People couldn’t tell if he was having fun or being violent. Somehow, during the closer (“Cut Your Hair”) my thumb found its way really close to his kidney.

Huh.

I don’t pick fights. I came close to picking one there. It didn’t spoil the show for me. But – if I may be all livejournaly for a moment – I learned that I can be a more angry, violent person than I thought. Always learn something new at Coachella.

ANYWAYS… “Stereo” is my favorite Pavement song and was the best of the set, for me. “Unfair,” “Cut Your Hair,” and “Summer Babe” were also great moments.

I have my guilty pop pleasures. I have cultivated an appreciation for hip-hop music. Post-punk really appeals to my cynical side, and I liken my relationship with post-punk to my relationship with science-fiction and comic books.

But Pavement’s set was the quintessential example of what I want indie rock to be. I smiled more, danced more, sang along more to that set than any other during the weekend. As soon as it ended I was half-tempted to walk out of the festival right there.

Apparently the crowd was small. (In the fan crush, it felt endless.) I’ve stopped thinking of indie rock as being “important”. It’s a niche musical interest. While not inherently exclusive, the elephant in the room is that indie rock is very much a “white guy thing” and the today’s music is (and should be) a lot more cosmopolitan. The 21st century president doesn’t listen to Pavement or Yo La Tengo. He listens to Jay-Z.

Whether they knew it or not, this made the set all the more special for those who saw it and cared.





I heard most of Thom Yorke’s set; a few songs at the side of the Outdoor Stage, and the rest across the way while I was writing rough drafts of my Buzz Bands post. He played The Eraser (which I own) in its entirety. Meh. Sounded nice enough, but I just don’t care. One might hope for something… more than a start-to-finish performance of a four year-old record, but Yorke / Radiohead fans aren’t exactly known for being picky!


I was excited for Gorillaz when the lineup was announced. I was expecting their 3D projection live show. That would make sense, since Coachella is a music and art festival. How cyberpunkarific would that have been?

Instead Damon Albarn and his host of famous musician guests played a pretty boring live show. They stuck to a lot of Plastic Beach material, at least to start, and the video screen work was utterly subpar compared to Jay-Z’s NYC skyline-shaped screen and Muse’s seizure-inducing effects.

I’d wanted to hear the jumpier, bouncier club hits. I was still riding the Pavement high. I think die-hard Gorillaz fans probably appreciated the set, but I was ready to go home.

A video of Snoop introing the show. "The revolution WILL be televised." Uh...

We got out of the parking lot quick.

The next morning I found my fucking car key.