Jessica Does Coachella Part Deux

May 24th, 2006

Hey kids, if you caught my last blog I told ya all about the beautiful and famous people rocking out at the Coachella Music Fest in Indio, CA. Time now for the real reason I went all the way out there. Music! And boy oh boy was there ever a lot of rock and roll. Now I didn’t go to this cool desert fest just to see mega-mainstreamers like Madonna and Kanye. But I gotta say, they killed it!

The only time I’d seen Kanye before was when I floor directed his performance of “Jesus Walks” at MMVA04, and that blew my mind. But this was something else. He came on like 25 minutes late, and with these festivals there are no exceptions on set times. So with only about a half hour to go, Mr. West took a moment to confer with his band, redo the set list, and what you got was an all out hit parade of his hottest tracks. Catonia and I were dancing and laughing and singing under the hot sun with 50,000 friends. Give or take. He had some stilly fun spinning retro dittys like a-ha’s “Take on Me” and MJ’s “Rock With You”. Seriously it was amazing.

My second favourite set belonged to Damian “Jr. Gong” Marley. He had the best timeslot. 6pm. The sun was starting to set, giving him the first light show of the fest. And the mood of the polo fields changes once that sun goes down. So that, plus his amazing reggae jams and some v.v. friendly ciggie passing made it a pretty perfect moment. Use your illusion please. My little sister might be reading this.

WOLFMOTHER!! “I fell down in the desert baby, yeah!” F***in outstanding. Four in the afternoon in a hot sticky tent. Check out this dude. File this under DON’T. Don’t wear a full-on wolf suit to a Wolfmother show in 95 degree heat in the desert. But A+ for band support.

Depeche Mode. The first band I ever discovered on my own. The first concert my parents let me go to without adult supervision making it the first girls’ night out of my life. Maybe I was just too excited. Too hyped. It was just OK. Not their best ever (that would be at the ACC in Toronto last week) Slow start but Dave and the boys picked it up at the end. It was my grade 7/8 Valentine’s Day dance all over again only without the after-stank of Drakkar Noir in my clothes.

Day two was all about Madonna. Her first music festival and she was playing in a small dance tent. The wave of people crossing the grounds in the dark to invade the Sahara Tent was somewhere between frightening and exhilarating. But no walls and a giant screen helped everyone get a glimpse of the Material Girl. But a glimpse is all you were gonna get cus there was no sound. Worst sound of the entire weekend – like it was coming out of a boom-box. So I couldn’t tell ya what 6 songs she sang, (yes only a 6 song set) but the woman worked it. She ripped up the stage. She shredded (or mock-shredded) on guitar. She told off the crowd. She wiped up water someone threw at her. She left. Not a half hour later Madge’s helicopter rose from the backstage, did a flyby over the thousands of music lovers, and disappeared into the dark sky. And word on the street is she got paid 2 mil for that. Blah.

After Madonna, what is there to do but drink in VIP and listen to Massive Attack and Tool do their thing. Maynard was in full on Brokeback meets Taxi Driver attire and brought on the noise. And thanks to Warped Tour mastermind Kevin Lyman for the post-Coachella come down bevvies. Always love seeing you and your bus in the camping grounds.

Other highlights: Imogen Heap, Ladytron, Cat Power, Eagles of Death Metal, Scissor Sisters, Atmosphere, Common, Sigur Ros, Franz Ferdinand, Phoenix, Gnarls Barkley, James Blunt, Metric, Editors, Paul Oakenfold, The Dears, Minus the Bear, Digable Planets (wha?), Bloc Party, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, The Magic Numbers, Mogwai, Art Brut, The Duke Spirit…

If you got this far you must be related to me. Thanks mom! So in the final part of Jessica’s West Coast Tour of Duty ’06 I’ll tell you about everything unrelated to the concert. Partying in Frank Sinatra’s pool, dinner with Pilate, texting with Bedouin, drinks with k-os, rocking to Joel Plaskett and new and vintage friends. Stay tuned for part 3!

Posted on Wednesday, May 24th, 2006 at 2:33 pm by Jessica and is filed under Blog.