COACHELLA 2010: Day 3
The last day of Coachella is always bittersweet, with the lack of energy and dehydration everybody is laying around the grass telling all their friends how badly they don’t want to go home. After an incredible past two days, I had a rough start to my last one (an unfortunate sunburn and missing two great bands I had planned on seeing—MuteMath and Local Natives). Fortunately, I got to the festival just in time for Florence and the Machine. Fully equipped with attitude and a harpist, the set truly peaked when Cold War Kids frontman Nathan Willet joined for a duet on the song “Hosptial Beds.” Shortly after was Julian Casablancas‘ set. I went with low expectations as I had heard the poor reviews from the shows he did a few months ago. Those low expectations were equally met with a low quality performance. There was no dance party, people showed up for “11th Dimension” and to ogle at Casablancas’ tight red jeans, and the entire set was utterly dull. However, I will give props to the fact he played “Hard to Explain,” making me and everyone else dream he’d quit the act and put out the new Strokes already.
Spoon had a phenomenal set, including special guest Deerhunter’s Bradford Cox playing guitar and White Rabbits frontman Stephen Patterson on drums for “Who Makes Your Money.” After seven albums and multiple tours, Spoon still delivers a set that leaves you wanting more. Towards the end of their set, the crowd started thinning out as people started making their way to the Phoenix set. A chart-topping album and a car commercial have done wonders for the Frenchies. By the time I made the transition, the closest I could get was a mile or so back from the stage. In their entire set, there was not one dull moment on and off the stage, the guys next to me discussed “with this band – every song is a hit.” I couldn’t agree more.
Pavement, one of the main reasons I made the trek to Coachella in the first place, were the best set of the day. It was the first time I’ve seen them since I was 5 years old and they made sure I instantly fell in love with them all over again. Playing a set that was as Stephen Malkmus put it “the 90s in a nutshell,” the slacker-indierock forbearers played every song just like how they would have 20 years ago, with extreme vigor and clamorous passion. There were definitely no bottles being thrown during the hour like the last time they appeared at Coachella, although the crowd was thin most likely due to the mostly born right as Pavement’s Slanted and Enchanted was released.
After hearing the rave reviews from the show last week at the Fox, I was excited to see Thom Yorke, err, Atoms for Peace, even though my energy level was at about a 2. The super 90s icon group comprised of Yorke, Chili Peppers’ Flea, and Nigel Godrich played the whole album, Eraser. I have a newfound appreciation for bassists after watching Flea rock it on “Harrowdown Hill.” For the encore, Yorke re-emerged with two awe-inspiring acoustic Radiohead songs and was then joined by the other atoms for “The Hollow Earth” to close out the festival with a bang for those who decided to skip out on Gorillaz such as myself.
The end of Coachella means back to reality, but at least it’s only a little over a month until Sasquatch!