Coachella 2012 was an interesting one.  First off, we're still not done with it.  There's going to be a "identical" weekend 2 coming up tomorrow which is just an odd idea.  Secondly, I actually had phone service for the first time ever so I was able to send out some random thoughts while I was there (collected for your enjoyment below).  This was also the first time it's ever rained at a Coachella, it's notorious for being VERY dry and hot all day.  In any case, enjoy!

Note:  It's in reverse cronological order so read it from the bottom up.

Just in time for the festival, I've finished my "one-line review" of all the bands.  I'm an old man now so I don't have time to keep up with all the junk the kids are listening to these days.  But I like to go through the Coachella bands and try to get a feel for what's out there

Methodology:   search for "<artist name> youtube" in google and judge the band on the first link to a youtube video.  Not their channel page or anything else, the first youtube video link.  So I just did "Radiohead Youtube", I'd have to decide to see Radiohead based on "Lotus Flower".  Bleh.  As you can see, my system has it's flaws, but it is a quick and dirty way to check out all the bands that are playing Coachella.

Note:  I have no idea why I threw out as much profanity as I did.  I really need to expand my vocabulary.
 

2010 will mark my 10th Coachella.  And this review will mark my 4th review (see 2002, 2003, 2004, and 2006).  It's been interesting watching the festival "grow up" over the past 12 years, every year little things get better, but they always seem to screw one thing up.  Needless to say, this is the best Coachella I've ever been to, and yes, I say that every year.

Last year I didn't really do any research on the bands.  So I went in wanting to check out a few bands and the days felt empty.  I had a lot of free time to walk around in the burning heat and eventually left thinking that I would never come back.  This year I did my home work and wrote up a quick review of all the bands at coachella.  So I had a plan on who I wanted to see, I was in front of a stage for most of the festival which in turn allowed me to see about 40 bands in 3 days.  Read on for my review.

Despite buying tickets at the box office after the first notice when I heard they were available, I can't honestly say I was entirely excited about seeing Starsailor on 9/11; but as the tickets had already been paid for, I didn't want them to go to waste so I met up with my brother and lined up at the venue.

Arriving at Irving Plaza a little after 7:30 PM behind about 8 people ahead of us, right from the start the vibe was good... we were chatting with other people on queue, joking around with Best Buy "scratch-and-win" giveaway cards the promoters were handing out by the stack full, and saying how James Walsh looks bigger in real life when the band passed us by.

Muse
July 21, 2006
Soma, San Diego, CA

I've been looking forward to seeing Muse ever since they played Coachella a few years ago. They had two shows in the area, LA's Greek Theatre which is a nice assigned seated outdoor amphitheatre, or San Diego's Soma, a hot dank sweaty general admission venue. Since I've never been to Soma, I opted for the SD show. And as a rule of thumb, general admission is always better then assigned seating, IMO.

Band Of Horses
Doug Fir Lounge
Portland OR
July 3, 2006

By Brian Sikora

I am not sure when exactly I became "unhip". I used to think of myself as fairly "with it". In fact, the people that know me consider me a walking music encyclopedia. Along with that title comes the knowledge of the up and coming bands before anyone else does. So when did that ship sail, because apparently it has. This was apparent by not having a clue that Band of Horses was the band of the moment. I knew who they were. I had enjoyed their album, but I usually enjoy those types of bands. Give me a band that sounds like My Morning Jacket, Grandaddy, the Shins, etc and I am all over it. So why did I miss their tremendous ascension?

I'm too tired to write a real review and it's already hard enough to talk about a DJ set because when you boil it down, it's just a dude playing records. Granted, this "dude" is the legendary Phil Hartnoll from Orbital and the records were all stored in a PowerBook, but it's still just a DJ set. So instead of actually writing anything, I just posted an IM conversation that I had with fellow Excellent Online contributor, Brian. Enjoy.

Gomez
San Diego, House of Blues
Sunday, May 20, 2006

Gomez is one of those "must-see" bands for me. No matter how many times they play or how good/bad their most recent album is, I need to see them every time. Despite being a fan, their last two records were kinda weak. There were some highlights, but overall they were just missing something. Thankfully their latest record, "How We Operate" is fantastic so I don't mind if they focus on new material.

This will be Coachella number seven for me. I've reviewed it a handful of times and even though I don't write too many reviews, I always enjoy posting a wrapup of the weekend (2002, 2003, and 2004). Click on the "read more" link for a full account of the events and an explaination as to why this might be the best Coachella I ever attended.

It's not very often you get to see the members of 3 bands on stage drop their pants at the end of their set and sing New Order's "Bizarre Love Triangle" while the audience realizes they're all wearing the same underwear: pink boyshorts with the South logo on them. Such was the case tonight at the Casbah in San Diego.