Coachella

A crucial fact about Coachella was that it was very very hot. Over 100 degrees in the scorching hot desert. Outdoors, with some acts in small tents. And each day started at 12:30 and ended at midnight. So human endurance played a role. I found myself saying, "I don't want to get there too early because I don't want to spend too much time in the hot sun." So I missed some good stuff out of necessity, to save my energy for the most important stuff.

Kraftwerk was very similar to the time I saw them in 1998 at the Warfield in SF. But they are undeniable. They had laptops this time around. I think their show should be permanently installed in Disneyland at Tomorrowland where the Carousel of Progress used to be or something.

The most fun thing I saw with the least baggage was LCD Sound System. The singer was frantically communicating with the sound people until the very last second but they burst out with a really nice energy.

Radiohead had an awesome light show. It is amazing to me how popular they are considering the morose and abstract nature of so much of their music. A lot of people were overheard saying they really only liked that one song. I had never seen them and was glad to get the chance.

When Belle and Sebastian played Stuart Murdoch mentioned that he had attended a local church service that morning. I wondered if he went to the same church my dad goes to. But I bet he's a Presbyterian.

The Pixies were tight and seemed to be enjoying themselves, and it was fun to hear Black Francis actually do the screams on "Tame."

Dizzee Rascal I was very curious to see, because I had heard a few really good recordings of his, but when he went on he was too rapid and undifferentiated to be interesting.

Stereolab is totally different without Mary Hansen. Laetitia just does all the vocals herself, and sometimes there will be an keyboard or whatever backing up on the harmony parts. They played Cybelle's Reverie and she ended up switching back and forth between both vocal parts at the end, which was a little unsatisfying. But it was nice to see them.

It's also worth mentioning the really nice art installations that were there, the skylights that converged overhead at night to give a dome effect, and the large amount of enjoyable flirting it was possible to do.

Things I missed that would have liked to see: Beck, Broken Social Scene, Erase Errata (just to see them in this setting that was so different from everywhere else I've seen them). There were so many choices, it was overwhelming.