Fans scope out the painted wood offerings in the Coachella Boutique. The Boutique features unique, limited items at the festival. (2012/File Photo)
This article was originally published on the front page of The Press-Enterprise on Sunday, April 6, 2014. See the print presentation on the cover and the jump.
BY VANESSA FRANKO
STAFF WRITER
The Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival isn’t just the 170 or so musical artists invading the Empire Polo Club in Indio.
Nor is it riding the Ferris wheel and looking down at 90,000 other concertgoers, or the sunset surrounded by palm trees and mountain vistas, or the sweaty dancing to the throbbing beats of DJs in the Sahara Tent.
Coachella, which runs April 11-13 and April 18-20, is an all-encompassing sensory experience and escape that’s about sound, taste and, if only for a weekend, embracing a different life.
“For Coachella, people go to have an experience that’s going to be unlike any experience that they can get at home. The lineups are less and less important,” said David Brooks, managing editor of trade magazine Venues Today.
Amenities include boutique shopping and a farmers’ market. And this year, Coachella also is catering to foodies and beer lovers with new concessions where they can indulge their taste buds with dishes such as grilled pork seasoned with lemongrass and basil or a handcrafted brew.
It’s also a chance for some festival immersion.
Coachella and its sister event, the Stagecoach Country Music Festival on April 25-27, each more than doubles the weekend population of Indio. Stagecoach and both Coachella weekends are sold out.
At Coachella, campers from around the world set up tents, creating a community half the size of a city block. At Stagecoach, many families treat the festival as a yearly vacation and stay in recreational vehicles in the grounds adjacent to the polo field.
Many of the fans at both festivals come back year after year.
The repeat business builds a nostalgia factor that keeps bringing people back to escape from their work-centric lives, said Derek Burrill, a UC Riverside associate professor in media and cultural studies.
“It is a place where you can go and camp and build a little universe, a microcosmic home for a couple of days,” Burrill said.
For Coachella, the population is “most likely the segment of our culture who are inundated, or just stuck in front of a computer screen all day,” Burrill said.
Fontana resident Jamie Carper, a 34-year-old paralegal and student, attended Coachella’s inaugural year in 1999 and has gone a half-dozen times since. He said he noticed a big change in the festival when it moved from single-day tickets to a three-day admission event. He started meeting people who traveled from as far away as Finland and Australia to experience the festival.
This year, Carper bought a Coachella pass that includes a four-course dinner from Outstanding in the Field in the exclusive VIP area rose garden. He didn’t necessarily want the luxury treatment, but the $600 pass was a way to get a ticket after the festival sold out — in less than three hours.
He usually stays in a hotel, but since all of the lodging in the area has been booked, he will be camping off-site in Indio.
“It’s my chance to get away from everything,” Carper said.
Part of the Coachella experience is that concertgoers can spend all three days of a festival weekend without ever leaving the grounds. The on-site tent campers arrive Thursday, before the music starts, and set up next to their cars.
The tent community has access to portable showers and multiple general stores on site. Campers can shop at a farmers market for fresh food. They can choose among performers on six stages and, after the music has wrapped for the night, there’s a silent disco: Campers can dance all night — wearing headphones so they don’t disturb those trying to sleep.
“The whole thing is like its own city,” said frequent Coachella-goer and Palm Springs resident Orlando Welsh.
The Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival aims for an experience byond just music. For 2014, pop-up gourmet restaurants and craft beer are part of the lineup. (2011/File Photo)
FOODIE WONDERLAND
This year’s festival features hip-hop group Outkast, modern progressive rock band Muse and indie rock darling Arcade Fire, but visitors to the event’s website will find pictures and profiles of chefs and pop-up restaurants that are even more extensive than those of the performers.
Some of the restaurants are for the VIPs, but the array on the general festival grounds will be expanded, too.
London chef Ben Spalding, who has worked in multiple Michelin-star restaurants, is bringing his Stripped Back concept — refined street food made in kitchens without proper fridges or freezers — to the everyman’s festival grounds.
Likewise, popular LA spot Night + Market will be represented in the general area, bringing Thai specialties such as “Hey-Ha” party wings and Isaan-style sausages, to the Coachella masses.
Among the VIP offerings are dishes from Chef Josef Centeno, whose menu will take items from his three downtown LA restaurants, Bäco Mercat, Bar Amá and Orsa & Winston.
The expansive array of cuisine may be new to Coachella, but the food emphasis already has taken hold elsewhere. Coachella actually is playing catch-up, Brooks said.
He said other festivals already have figured out that there’s money to be made on the auxiliary revenues. At San Francisco’s Outside Lands, food and wine are major components of the experience, for example. Outside Lands even has an on-site sommelier.
It’s a ready-made market, Brooks said, because people who go to Coachella want to spend money on good quality food and beverages.
BOTTOMS UP
Another new Coachella festival amenity is a craft beer area, where fans can knock back more than the standard Heineken — a staple because the company is a Coachella sponsor. The brews have yet to be announced, so beer aficionados will have to use their imaginations for now.
“The lineup of the beers is being treated like a talent lineup,” Brooks said.
For Thomas White, of Boston, Coachella has been his yearly vacation since 2007. The 31-year-old clinical studies associate will retire from the fest after this year because of the cost of traveling to the festival and because he wants to visit Europe and Australia. He estimated that he spends $1,000 on a ticket, condo rental and flight and almost another $1,000 on the rental car, gas, food, alcohol and miscellaneous.
For his final trip to Indio, White is excited about the new food options and the fact that he can sip a beer other than Heineken.
“I don’t care how much it costs,” White said.
The festival also will offer a few high-end cocktails catering to fans of mezcal, rum and whiskey. The cocktails will be curated by the establishments of Cedd Moses, who owns some of the hippest bars in LA, and served in the VIP Rose Garden area.
Ultimately, the newest amenities are only part of what organizers are striving for with Coachella. The music put the festival on the map, but the whole entity is what brings back the repeat customers.
“I go every year — it’s literally the greatest experience,” White said.
Contact Vanessa Franko at 951-368-9575 and vfranko@pe.com
IF YOU GO
WHEN: April 11-13, April 18-20, Empire Polo Club
WHERE: 81-800 Avenue 51, Indio
ADMISSION: General passes are sold out, but check secondary markets at your own risk. Some passes paired with Outstanding in the Field dinners are available for $600 for general admission and $1,024 for VIP.
INFORMATION: www.coachella.com
A sampling of the foodie establishments at Coachella 2014
- Crossroads Kitchen, Los Angeles
- Eveleigh, West Hollywood
- Goldie’s, Los Angeles
- Bäco Mercat, Bar Amá, and newly-opened Orsa & Winston by Josef Centeno, Los Angeles
- Mexicali Taco & Co., Los Angeles
- Night + Market, West Hollywood
- Stripped Back, London, England
- KazuNori, Los Angeles
- Semi Sweet bakery, Los Angeles
- The Church Key, Los Angeles
- Tony’s Darts Away, Burbank
- Mohawk Bend, Echo Park
- Beer Belly, Los Angeles
- Salt & Straw Ice Cream, Portland, Ore.
- Bon Puf Cotton Candy, Los Angeles
- Clover juice shop, Los Angeles