Tag Archives: Coachella 2008

Whew–have you recovered from Coachella 2008 yet?

My head is still swimiming, but I am back and blogging with some extra stuff I wasn’t able to get in during the busy, busy weekend.

First up–here’s what I’m deeming my first ever Coachella Citizens Award, which goes to a Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival first-timer for capturing what the spirit of the show is about.

This year’s winner is Cara Rauh of Oregon.

She attended Coachella for the first time with a friend who was in the U.S. from Brazil who suggested they attend the festival.

It was Rauh’s first big festival and she decided to camp out. In her early 30s, she was a bit concerned about what she had gotten into when she saw a younger demographic at the campground, but she was impressed by how smoothly things ran checking in and getting tickets and everything that was needed.

“I love being introduced to new music,” Rauh said.

The highlights for her were the bands. I met Rauh while checking out Vampire Weekend’s set on Friday and she was truly thrilled to be exposed to new sounds from bands she wouldn’t otherwise hear.

So maybe the pig wasn’t supposed to drift up, up and away during Roger Waters’ set Sunday night.

Check out this press release I just got, now that I’ve awaken from the post-Coachella coma-like state.

Coachella organizers are offering $10,000 and four festival tickets for life in exchange for the safe return of the two-story inflatable pig that broke loose during Roger Waters’ set on the final night (Sunday, April 27) of the 2008 Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival. The pig escaped and floated into the desert sky just prior to the intermission between Roger Waters’ back-to-back sets–marking the only back-to-back Coachella sets by one artist in the critically acclaimed festival’s history.

Anyone with information on the lost pig should e-mail lostpig@coachella.com.

The Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival is known for its moments–those fleeting periods of magic that last for mere minutes shared by only those who make the musical pilgrimage to the Empire Polo Field in Indio.

While one of the most talked about moments came on Saturday night when Prince covered Radiohead’s “Creep,” perhaps the most appropriate one was when a giant inflatable pig floated above the crowd and drifted into the air over the Coachella Valley, signaling the end of the first half of Roger Waters’ set and the beginning of the end of this year’s edition of Coachella.

Waters, a driving force behind psychedelic rock band Pink Floyd, delivered the most visually stunning set ever in Coachella’s history. A shower of pyrotechnics engaged when Waters opened his set with “The Show” off the epic “The Wall.”

He and his full band, complete with powerful female backup singers,played some of Pink Floyd’s best, such as “Shine On You Crazy Diamond,” “Wish You Were Here” and “Mother.”

To cap the Pink Floyd retrospective set, he ended with “Pigs,” as an inflatable porcine, spray-painted with a cartoon of Uncle Sam and the words “Don’t be led to the slaughter” hovered over the crowd before being cut loose.

After an intermission, Waters and his band came back to perform “Dark Side of the Moon” in its entirety, with stellar sound throughout the entire show.

Green lights flooded the stage when the unforgettable bass line for “Money” began and with every crescendo in “Us and Them, bright white lights pierced through the crowd.

However that set’s crowning moment came at the end, when was a three-dimensional triangular prism hung over the stage, slowly pirouetting as lights projected a clear rainbow of color on the smoky haze, bringing the icon album cover for “Dark Side of the Moon” to life and turning the crowd into a living part of it.

Waters wasn’t even finished. He and the band came back onstage to rile the crowd into a fist-pumping frenzy for “Another Brick in the Wall Part II” and an ultimate finale of “Comfortably Numb.”

Roger Waters plays "Another Brick In the Wall Part II" for an encore at Coachella.

Roger Waters plays "Wish You Were Here" at Coachella.

I am so happy I am finally seeing My Morning Jacket.

I also forgot how great the Coachella film crew is. They make the video screens look like you are watching a high def concert film, not just a video screen at a concert.

I am also amazed by the hair of the My Morning Jacket gang. It’s flowing and nothing short of amazing.

I think the sun might be getting to people, inducing odd behavior.

Then again that’s probably just Coachella being Coachella.

In the past hour, I’ve seen a guy with a giant red mouse head, a burlesque show and mimes playing cymbals, and that’s just the performers.

I may have also seen Steven Spielberg and Anthony Kiedis, from the Red Hot Chili Peppers, in the crowd, though I can’t be sure.

The artists in today’s lineup are having fun.

The electronica music artist Deadmau5 stayed in character, refusing to remove his giant foam red alien mouse head during interviews with the foreign press.

Then the Gogol Bordello set sent the audience into an impromptu Russian danceoff, complete with one girl wearing a headdress and little else jumping off picnic tables.

A large chunk of crowd later ended up in the treehouse where the Lightning in a Bottle troupe did a burlesque show in mime, skidding across a pool and spraying the audience with a hose.

Coachella folks always bring a cast of characters to the festival, and you never know who’s going to show up.

Sean Penn, though, gets my vote for least spontaneous performer after delivering the same speech to both crowds. His security made sure the pit was clear of any of those pesky photographers.

Although, to be fair, he did quote Spicoli in his second set.

John Asbury
jasbury@PE.com

“Revolution is a young man’s job, and it’s your turn to be revolutionaries.”

This is from Penn’s second Coachella address, this one from the main Coachella Stage.

OK, so, since part of what we do here is evaluate performances, I just have to say I was slightly underwhelmed by his speech.

I like what he’s trying to do — inspire young people to activism and grass-roots efforts to make a difference — but his lackadasical delivery wasn’t inspiring at all.

I didn’t expect him to come out with a full gospel choir backing him and for him to preach The Word, but it woulda helped had he done something that seemed a little less like even HE wasn’t impressed with what he was accomplishing.

On the other hand, for all you folks who sometimes say, “I want to help, I just don’t know how,” well, if you’ve got the time, there are organizers working on the how.

Here’s his group’s site.