Photography by Philip Cosores
When the New York Times published their assertion that Coachella (along with other major festivals boasting many of the same acts) wasn’t necessary for their publication to cover, it didn’t take long for counterpoints to arise. But coming out of the 2016 edition of the festival, the Times piece still lingers in the ether. Granted, Coachella didn’t set out to prove the newspaper wrong; it would never have to respond to broad criticisms like that. But throughout the first weekend of its seventeenth installment in Indio, California, the enormous gathering of musicians and fans felt like a solid punch to the guts of critics everywhere.
Obviously, some aspects of the knocks on Coachella hold weight. In terms of the lineup, Calvin Harris did not work as a headliner. The draw was huge, but no lasting impression was made as the DJ leaned on songs written by other people, coming across as a glorified club DJ performing on the biggest stage in the world. EDM drew tons of folks elsewhere, too, with acts like Zedd, Flume, and The Chainsmokers drawing some of the biggest crowds of the weekend. For the most part, these big name DJs co-exist with other genres of music at the festival in an organic, even beneficial way. But for a moment during Harris’ set, the spotlight shone brightly on contemporary populist electronic music, and it wasn’t a pretty sight.
The best of the DJs made their sets one-of-a-kind with special guests. None of them could top Disclosure, who brought out a parade of featured vocalists including Lorde and Sam Smith, or Zedd, who got an assist from Kesha, one of the music industry’s most talked about figures in recent months. Sure, Harris welcomed Big Sean and Rihanna, but they were too late in the set to alleviate the boredom that set in on a large scale.
And these guests have become a defining feature of Coachella that serves as one of the biggest rebuttals to critics that would call it just another music festival. When the lineup is announced, it’s now a given that there will be many unannounced appearances that offer up special moments for fans. This year included the likes of Kanye West (appearing with both A$AP Rocky and Jack Ü), Bernie Sanders (showing up by video to introduce Run the Jewels — which also saw Nas and DJ Shadow as guests), The Eagles’ Joe Walsh (welcomed by The Arcs), Kristen Wiig, Paul Dano, and Maddie Ziegler (who all assisted in Sia’s incredible spectacle), AC/DC’s Angus Young (previewing Axl Rose’s upcoming gig during Guns N’ Roses’ set), and Janelle Monáe and Aristophanes (collaborating on-stage with Grimes). Coachella’s poster would have looked a lot different if these (and the many other) collaborations had been announced ahead of time, but not knowing all the details of what will happen is part of what makes the event so special.
Music aside, what many don’t consider about Coachella is just how beautiful the festival is. Over 17 years, the organizers have honed their craft at throwing a singular party, and everywhere you look while bouncing from stage to stage is a stunning piece of art or the area’s natural landscape. At night, the palm trees light up in reds, blues, and greens while illuminated balloons fly into the sky. Coachella, for a couple weekends each year, manages to develop its own universe, and while many other festivals attempt such a feat, the amount that actually achieve such a spectacle is a rarity.
Who knows if FOMO has struck the New York Times in the wake of Coachella, but for both journalists and fans, the fact is that if you weren’t there, you did miss out. Live streams are no substitute for being there. Nearly two decades later, Coachella hasn’t lost the ability to create lasting memories and exhilarate the senses. That’s why we keep coming back, and why we’re always happy when we do.
While Consequence of Sound couldn’t see everything this weekend, we did manage to catch quite a bit. Click ahead to view our rankings of Coachella’s sets, from worst to best, along with an exclusive photo gallery.
–Philip Cosores
Deputy Editor
Calvin Harris
Let’s not mince words: It was the worst headlining set in Coachella history. Quantifiably and objectively worse than the previous champ, Drake’s stiff turd of a performance last year. Calvin Harris’ utterly pointless 70-minute finale to an otherwise consistently solid day dotted by very few crap turns was so nearly a complete waste of time and money that it was easy to imagine far more ludicrous Coachella headliners who would nonetheless be more entertaining — El Bieber, for starters. Not that anyone among the massive crowd (surely the largest ever on the Polo Field) would agree. They just kept on dancing and cheering for an exceptionally ordinary mix synced to a ginormously generic light show. They didn’t care that T-Swift didn’t come out for a couple songs, like so many were hoping Harris’ girlfriend to do. Doesn’t matter, because look! There’s Rihanna! Up on that platform by the sound booth! Like Kanye was five years ago! She’s even kinda singing! Couple lines, at least. Well, who cares if it’s mostly fake? The whole thing’s fake. Only positives about it were the fireworks and the rings of lights on the speaker towers. Looked cool. The rest was passé bullshit. Seriously: “Eat. Sleep. Rave. Repeat”? How played out is that? Where’s Daft Punk when you really need ’em? –Ben Wener
Halsey
If scientists were to somehow engineer a hipster android but get the formula for “cool” slightly wrong, they’d end up with something that looks and sounds like 21-year-old electropop superstar Halsey. Don’t get us wrong: Halsey has a knack for writing memorable hooks, and her stage show features enough pyrotechnics and pole dancers that the spectacle alone is worth the price of admission. It’s just that everything else about her is so damn corny. Halsey sings about getting drunk in Bed-Stuy as if she’s living out the highest form of poetry, but even those missives from la-la land are preferable to deeply unsexy, trying-too-hard lyrics like: “If you wanna go to heaven, you should fuck me tonight.” At every turn, Halsey drops a reminder that she’s young and prone to embarrassing ideas. Speaking of embarrassment, how about that surprise guest? “When I was a kid, there was one band that changed my life,” the singer told her rapt audience. Then she brought out Brendon Urie of Panic! At the Disco. Let that soak in for a moment, then light yourself on fire. –Collin Brennan
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Years & Years
If he appeared anywhere other than on stage, it would have been easy to mistaken Olly Alexander for just another fashion-forward festivalgoer. The Years & Years frontman emerged wearing a strange (but perfectly Coachella) outfit that combined basketball shorts with an elaborate ring of feathers draped around his neck. “I didn’t take into account the wind when I put on my feathers this morning,” Alexander joked before ditching the birdman look about halfway through the group’s set. But the wind ruined more than just the affable singer’s aesthetics. Years & Years are fine as far as electronic pop goes, and some of their songs (“King” and “Shine”, for example) could become 18-and-up club hits for years to come. But they’re not strong enough performers to warrant the main stage at Coachella, and Alexander simply didn’t have a strong enough voice to contend with the wind that literally took his wings away. To make matters worse, Alexander didn’t even have the best feathers on Friday. (He can thank Sufjan Stevens for that). –Collin Brennan
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DMA’s
A scheduling quirk made Saturday Coachella’s unofficial “Australian Appreciation Day,” with Courtney Barnett, RÜFÜS DU SOL, and even AC/DC guitarist Angus Young (a surprise Guns N’ Roses guest) appearing at the top of the lineup. But the Aussie love affair began early in the afternoon with a set from DMA’s, a group of young blokes (and recent CoSigns) who apparently have their own love affair with a little Britpop band called Oasis. No, DMA’s isn’t just a carbon copy or a glorified cover band, but it’s hard to deny the lineage when listening to their debut album Hills End. If only the band could be bothered to show a little effort on stage — even if that meant fist fighting each other — they might have been remembered beyond their set. But DMA’s lackadaisical nature failed to charm most everyone in the crowd and left us wondering, They flew all the way from Down Under for this? –Collin Brennan
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Sheer Mag
Coachella’s first weekend got off to an inauspicious start for those who arrived early enough to see the first set of bands. Festival organizers didn’t open the gates until well past noon, leaving Philadelphia punks Sheer Mag to hold what was essentially a glorified band practice while fans sprinted to catch the end of their set. Led by wrecking-ball vocalist Tina Halladay, the band made the best of a bad situation by blitzing through their collection of no-nonsense rock songs as if they were playing a packed basement rather than a nearly empty tent. But Sheer Mag’s full-steam-ahead energy might have ironically been their undoing. The band wrapped up their set with a good 10 minutes to spare, meaning only a handful of people caught more than two songs. What a bummer. –Collin Brennan
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Deerhunter
You never know quite what to expect at a Deerhunter show, thanks to mercurial frontman Bradford Cox and his penchant for letting whatever current mood he’s in dominate the proceedings. Playing to an absolutely packed Mojave tent, Cox indulged the least interesting of his many moods, delivering a sleepy, listless set that didn’t leave the crowd much to get excited about. The rest of the band tried to liven up Fading Frontier highlights like “Breaker” and “Living My Life” with a more jammy, percussive sound, but the result lacked any kind of emotional resonance. It wasn’t quite groovy enough to dance to, either. A disappointing set from a band that could (and should) have been one of Saturday’s stronger acts. –Collin Brennan
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Mavis Staples
No one enjoys picking on a living legend as kindhearted and uplifting as the Staple Singers’ shining star. Yet the usually marvelous Mavis Staples wasn’t at her most dazzling during Friday afternoon’s set in Gobi. Blame the elements — clearly the high winds and desert air had taken a toll on Ms. Mavis’ typically heartier roar, reduced here to guttural howls on classics like “Respect Yourself” and “I’ll Take You There”. Her scattershot performance wound up more engaging between songs than during them, whether proudly recalling her family’s participation in the 1965 civil rights march from Selma to Montgomery or sweetly saluting Sunday night attraction Sia with a snippet of “Chandelier”. (“That little girl is gonna come after me. I best cut that out.”) Only in the thick of a swampy take on Talking Heads’ “Slippery People” did she really catch fire; the gems from her new M. Ward-produced album Livin’ On A High Note lacked luster. As this grand dame of spiritual soul might say: “Shucks.” –Ben Wener
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The 1975
The 1975 get a lot of shit, and they deserve some of it. Led by preening frontman Matthew Healy, the Manchester band is one part irresistible synthpop hooks and one part insufferable fashion show. They’re as hard to like as they are to get out of your head, and both qualities were on full display during the band’s sundown set on Sunday. It started out a bit rough, with Healy playing to the cameras rather than the audience, as he is wont to do sometimes. But as soon as the band settled into their new environs (this was the first show of a full US tour), they showed why they just might be the most ambitious pop band working today. All of the set’s highlights came near the end, starting with the troupe of backup singers that led the crowd through new single “The Sound”. The band then brought it back to basics and closed with their earliest hit, “Sex”, a reminder that once upon a time they were the heirs apparent to Jimmy Eat World instead of INXS. –Collin Brennan
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Bat for Lashes
Unveiling new music at Coachella is expected, even eagerly awaited, especially from an artist as captivating on record as Natasha Khan has been. So opening with a fresh cut isn’t necessarily a buzzkill. But slotting so many others alongside it certainly can be. From the teasers offered here, Bat for Lashes’ forthcoming effort — July’s The Bride, her first in four years — sounds intriguing and possibly insightful, the way PJ Harvey can be in her most introspective mode. It also smacks of conceptualism preferably heard under headphones and with just enough candlelight to illuminate a lyric sheet. In the thick of the hot desert air, and in front of only a thousand or so tired stragglers fading impatiently with each delicate passage, it made for a difficult connection, even with Khan looking lovely and singing beautifully. –Ben Wener
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Gary Clark, Jr.
On paper and in person, Gary Clark Jr. makes a ton of sense on Coachella’s main stage. The Austin-based bluesman isn’t out to change the world, and he’s content to blow minds the old-fashioned way: with riffs so thick you could spread ‘em on a slice of Texas toast. Gaggles of righteous dude-bros gravitated over to the stage as soon as their ears got a taste of the aforementioned riffage — a reminder that technical virtuosity still goes a long way toward winning the day at major music festivals. There were moments in Clark’s set when he soloed for so long and with such intensity that applause felt like a foregone conclusion, and maybe that’s its own kind of problem. The sheer force of Clark’s guitar work often overshadows the songs themselves, which aren’t particularly memorable or unique enough to stand out in the crowded field of blues rock. Even if his own set failed to make a lasting impression, Clark served as the weekend’s unofficial all-star by lending his riffs to Run the Jewels, Anderson Paak., and (presumably) countless backstage jam sessions. –Collin Brennan
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Pete Yorn
If you were looking for a sharp, hard-working, easy-to-like singer-songwriter who’s been hopelessly aged out of Coachella, Jersey boy Pete Yorn was your guy. You and about 200 of your friends could have chilled in the shade of Mojave, wondering what this dude in red-tinted Roy Orbison glasses was doing here, virtually unchanged 14 years after his last appearance here. You probably wouldn’t know anything off his first work in six years, Arranging Time, and you probably wouldn’t have remembered what he played from it 10 minutes after he was done. But you did remember those catchy oneS from his first album, like the rollicking “Life on a Chain” and the still-winsome “Strange Condition.” And you loved the spot-on cover of Morrissey’s “Suedehead”. –Ben Wener
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Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeroes
By nightfall on Sunday it’s expected that most of the crowd will appear exhausted, but the talent they’re still zombie-trudging across the field to see shouldn’t be. Leave it to Alex Ebert, who has never been remotely as focused as he was six years ago in the Magnetic Zeroes‘ fest-stealing Coachella debut, to turn a perfectly wonderful neo-hippie vibe-along into a bumbling mess that limped to a finish. It started off so stirringly, like so many Sharpe sets before, this time with an impromptu bit of hand clapping leading into “Somewhere”, a new track evoking the Jefferson Airplane having a folk freakout inside a stained-glass church, and then carried on livelier with the sway of “Forty Days”. After that, and a drag off a joint handed up from the crowd, Ebert, who always seems to be trying a little too hard to become the new Wayne Coyne, instead seemed as random as a unmedicated ADHD kid. As usual, for every inspired moment — like the sincerity of one fan (“you changed my life, man!”) when Ebert turned the mic over to the audience in place of banter with much-missed Jade Castrinos on “Home” — there were twice as many scatterbrained distractions. And damn did “Home” drag. –Ben Wener
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HÆLOS
London trip-hop group HÆLOS may market themselves as a trio, but their live show benefits immensely from the addition of two percussionists who lend a backbone to prop up all that heavy atmosphere. Dressed all in black and playing in front of a thick curtain that blotted out the early afternoon sun, the group came across more like a force of nature and less like the lightweight version of Massive Attack they sometimes sound like on record. Of the three credited vocalists — Lotti Benardout, Arthur Delaney, and Dom Goldsmith — Bernardout is the clear standout, with a voice that communicates vulnerability but clearly asserts itself in the mix. Still, HÆLOS are at their most interesting when all three vocalists play off each other, taking different tracks in the verse and then meeting up again in the chorus. –Collin Brennan
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Wolf Alice
Wolf Alice may be gearing up to support fellow Brits The 1975 on their upcoming North American tour, but they seem much less concerned with cultivating a fashionable image. Led by a powerful vocalist in Ellie Rowsell, the quartet turned Coachella’s Outdoor Theater into a demonstration of why they might one day be Britain’s band to beat. Breathless rockers like “Fluffy” and “Giant Peach” — both off 2015’s My Love Is Cool — found the band firing on all cylinders and staring straight into the afternoon sun without so much as a flinch. Wolf Alice hasn’t quite made it to the point where they can captivate an audience for more than 30 minutes at a time, but give them a few more albums and they’ll more than earn an invitation to the main stage. –Collin Brennan
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Ellie Goulding
Two years ago, Ellie Goulding was still on her way to becoming radio-omnipresent and a favorite of EDM button-pushers, and her Coachella stage performance felt like it, bursting with gotta-prove-something vocal gymnastics and boundless energy that would make any Pilates instructor envious. But now the spritely “Love Me Like You Do” singer is a bona fide stateside star capable of selling out vast spaces coast to coast. Which is the very reason she shouldn’t have been booked for a return, at least not so soon: Her set, though chock-full of hits that had multitudes (of mostly women) chanting along, still came off as just her touring production condensed for maximum festival impact, replete with Madonna-style turns on guitar and arena-ready visuals that prove how prepared Goulding is to eventually join the ranks of celebrity CoverGirl models.
Much to her credit, she didn’t wilt in the heavy winds, braving it with gusto even as it rendered her vocals raspier (a plus) and increasingly adenoidal (a minus), although a low-key, piano-led version of “Lights” only underscored how wispy her pipes can be without all that studio sweetening. And still it’s hard to hate the chanteuse in a crop-top and flowing cape to match her running trainers, even as she becomes something of a danceable Celine Dion for the electro scene. She may not have the command or presence Florence Welch showed in this same time slot last year, but her popularity isn’t a fluke, either. –Ben Wener
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Deafheaven
The pummelling San Francisco metal group known as Deafheaven drew one of the smallest crowds of the weekend, but don’t go pointing fingers at them. While everyone else was off watching Calvin Harris add beats to a mediocre mix CD, these guys were busy tearing down the Mojave tent so the grounds crew wouldn’t have to. Frontman George Clarke screamed and snarled as if he was playing to a crowd of thousands, and drummer Daniel Tracy showed off why his double bass drum hits rank among the heaviest in the business. Still, the band was never going to be an easy sell on this lineup, and the late start time only added to an atmosphere that seemed a bit sapped of energy. If we could watch from the front row without having to squeeze through sweaty bodies, this was something less than a proper Deafheaven show. –Collin Brennan
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Underworld
Underworld’s Friday evening set marked probably the first time anybody over the age of 19 stepped foot inside the audio-visual orgy known as the Sahara tent. The long-running British electronic group definitely stuck out from their younger counterparts, but for reasons that show why they’ve managed to stay relevant for three decades and counting. Led by frontman Karl Hyde — who definitely had some swagger in his step — the group wasted no time luring bodies to the dance floor with “I Exhale”, the lurching lead single from their new record Barbara Barbara, we face a shining future. The sounds and flashing laser lights only got crazier from there, leaving one to wish that every set could have taken place in the immersive Sahara tent. It certainly would have helped LCD Soundsystem (not that they needed help, but still…). –Collin Brennan
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Vince Staples
Courtesy of Coachella
You never know what mood Vince Staples will be in when he takes the stage. The volatile Long Beach rapper has a reputation for getting surly when the crowd doesn’t immediately respond to his demand to “Bounce!”, but the crazy-ass Sahara tent proved up to the challenge. With nothing to get mad at, Staples channeled his manic energy into a tight set filled with hits from last year’s Summertime ‘06. He didn’t waste any of Coachella’s considerable resources, calling on special guest Jhené Aiko early on and plastering his typical video collages across Sahara’s dozens of screens. Not sure how many of the kids appreciated the Vanilla Sky montage, but we sure did. –Collin Brennan
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Låpsley
On her debut album Long Way Home, the 19-year-old Liverpudlian who goes by Låpsley rarely sounds comfortable. Like all teenagers, she’s exploring just exactly where she fits in the world, and this sometimes means pairing organic melodies with transparently synthetic blips and beats. It turns out that Låpsley is just as uncomfortable in person — and quite charmingly so. The singer experienced technical difficulties almost as soon as she appeared on stage at the Mojave tent, but she powered through the brief mishap with the grace of a performer twice her age.
She then proceeded to pepper her set with some hilarious stage banter (“Someone said before that I was dressed like a giant vagina, but I thought nudes were in!”) and at least three or four songs that deserve to be hits. OK, “Hurt Me” kind of is already a hit, but tunes like the soulful “Operator (He Doesn’t Call Me)” allow Låpsley to communicate the same heartbreak in a way that’s altogether more fun. If she ever gets those backup dancers she jokingly asked for during a lull in the music, she’ll be an even bigger joy to watch in person. –Collin Brennan
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HEALTH
There were moments during HEALTH’s Friday afternoon set when the LA noise rock trio sounded as if they were going to tear the whole Mojave tent down. And then there were moments of industrial pop bliss that lured in passersby unaware of HEALTH’s precarious balance between hooks and outright chaos. The band’s sound has grown sleeker and more refined with each passing record, but it would be unfair (and just plain wrong) to say they’ve lost their edge. As they did on 2015’s underrated Death Magic, HEALTH continues to explore new ways to communicate “heavy” in a live setting. Bassist John Famiglietti still calls forth sounds from the depths of hell with his pedalboard, but nobody’s more responsible for keeping the band’s bone-crushing tendencies alive than drummer BJ Miller. Both guys were on point in the unfamiliar festival setting; in fact, their performance felt like the moment Coachella officially started. –Collin Brennan
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Foals
If you aren’t already a true believer, Foals can be a tough sell at a festival like Coachella. With so much AV porn to be had over at the Sahara tent and closer-to-home indie heroes Lord Huron holding it down at the Outdoor Theatre, why waste an hour of the afternoon humoring yet another generic English rock band? Well, because it turns out “generic” is a dead-wrong way to describe these guys. Led by frontman Yannis Philippakis, Foals really brought the heat to their Friday set on the main stage, bursting out of the gates with a series of thick, bluesy riffs that punched a hole in the tepid atmosphere left behind by Years & Years. Not long after playing the first notes of Holy Fire standout “Providence”, Philippakis worked his way down to the crowd and stood above the front row like a conqueror demanding respect from his subjects. But it was the quieter, groovier moments between these rock ‘n’ roll highs that really won us over to Philippakis and Co.. Knowing how to work a festival crowd is one thing, but it helps when you have a stable of consistently dynamic songs to lean on. Foals do, and they rank among Friday’s pleasant surprises. –Collin Brennan
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Algiers
Algiers play a strange blend of gospel, soul, and post-punk that skews political and stands a few feet to the side of Coachella’s more typical offerings. The Atlanta trio’s penchant for sonic dissonance reflects frontman Franklin James Fisher’s lyrical themes, which touch on racial tension and the cold sensation of being displaced in one’s own home. Speaking of displacement, Algiers were an odd fit in their early Saturday slot. Other than Savages, no band at Coachella could hope to match their intensity, and it would have been interesting to see what kind of atmosphere they could have conjured up with a late-night set. It might have saved them some dry-cleaning bills, too, because the afternoon sun caused Fisher to soak right through his brown leather jacket by the end of the second song. –Collin Brennan
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Death Grips
Man, did Coachella need Death Grips in 2016. While undeniably impressive overall, the festival’s lineup seemed a bit too clean and polished this year, offering fans precious few opportunities to rub their ears in pure filth. The abrasive punk/hip-hop group took care of that just in time, transforming the Gobi tent (chandeliers and all) into a noisy, sweaty affair late Sunday night. As per usual, MC Ride and co. didn’t leave their audience much room to breathe, diving into song after song with enough force to knock the wind out of those moshing in the front rows. None of this is particularly noteworthy as far as Death Grips shows go, but in this context the band made everyone else sound like total wimps. –Collin Brennan
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Zella Day
It’s entirely possible that Zella Day looks back on Coachella 2016 as the moment that launched her career in earnest. It would be fitting, too. No other artist in the lineup feels more at home in the desert than the 21-year-old singer-songwriter, who grew up in Pinetop, Arizona and has the whole hippie-chic aesthetic down pat. Day was one of Saturday’s pleasant surprises, delivering a tight set of anthemic indie pop that stuck in our heads for the rest of the afternoon. Day is an undeniably powerful vocalist, and at several points in her set she achieved a nice vibrato effect that recalled Stevie Nicks for all the right reasons. How perfect, then, that she would cover “Rhiannon” and dedicate the song to the original “Queen of Coachella.” Day’s still got a long way to go, but it’s not crazy to think she could one day claim that throne. –Collin Brennan
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St Germain
Whoever was buzzing about the long-overdue return of this essentially French but mostly West African outfit, who last came to Indio back in 2001 … yeah, well, none of them were actually in the desert to witness it. When the group began, with The Kills and Of Monsters and Men still pulling large crowds elsewhere, there couldn’t have been but 300 people inside Gobi; by the end of their vibey melange (think global sophisticate acid house), that number had maybe grown to a thousand. What everyone else missed, as this past weekend’s more adventurous ears discovered, was a sundown peak to a slow-burn afternoon that had been punctuated by primo world beat, starting with Congolese outfit Mbongwana Star as the fest got underway and gathering steam with French-Cuban twin sisters Ibeyi later in the day.
St Germain, however, arrived with the most hype, and matched it convincingly. Its mastermind, Ludovic Navarre, kept to the rear, easily mistaken for a mispositioned mixing engineer while his ensemble of highly estimable players (including Senegalese superstar Cheikh Lo on the many-stringed kora) grooved fluidly. Occasionally they lined-danced and even played patty cake through one heady jam after another, from the jittery signature “Rose Rouge” to the frothier “So Flute”. Give it another 15 years. This turn will probably be just as cultishly regarded as their first. –Ben Wener
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Mbongowana Star
For a band playing their very first show on American soil, Mbongowana Star took little time making themselves at home on the Gobi stage. One way to look at the soulful Congolese soukous group is as an inspirational story — co-frontmen Coco Ngabali and Theo Nzonza are both paraplegic, and the mere fact that they made it from the streets of Kinshasa to the tent at Coachella is worth celebrating. But roughly everybody trickling into the festival on Friday afternoon had no idea about the band’s origins; they just wanted to start the weekend on a good note, and Mbongowana Star obliged by providing one of the most danceable — and certainly one of the most distinctive — soundtracks of the day. The band’s songs mix traditional Congolese soukous with elements of funk, reggae, and R&B, but once again, the details matter less when you’re so busy getting down. –Collin Brennan
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The Kills
Unlike so many Coachellas past, this one was gratefully overrun by hordes of talented women, from pop to performance art and every stop in between. Too few of them, however, embody traits beyond diva-in-training posturing, and even fewer merit that so-overused descriptor “badass.” But then there’s Alison Mosshart, who you can slot next to Savages for sheer badassness. From the outset of The Kills‘ starkly powerful performance, as the galloping digital beat of “No Wow” began to lure lookie-loos over to their mean side, it was apparent the sultry Englishwoman in black leather pants had braced herself for battle against hair-whipping, dust-spewing zephyrs that would have done in most mere mortals.
Can you imagine the helium-high falsetto of new R&B sensation Gallant (duetting with Seal on “Crazy” in Mojave at the same time) surviving the same conditions? No, you can’t. But Mosshart thrived in that mix, even if her vocals were never as high as they should have been. Whether coiled in a white guitar cord during the churning windup of “Kissy Kissy” or blasting full force through the fresh track “Doing It to Death,” she and her partner in starkness, Jamie Hince, remained relentless, reminding pit onlookers like Katy Perry and Jared Leto what a torrential force they can be under any circumstances. –Ben Wener
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M83
There has been solid reason to suspect that Anthony Gonzalez and his rearranged troupe (farewell, Morgan Kibby, you’re missed) might have peaked five years ago when the earworm “Midnight City” lifted the group from cult adoration to almost mainstream level. Milking that success for all it was worth and then taking an eon (in indie/pop terms) to follow it up hasn’t helped instill confidence that M83 wouldn’t simply, perhaps happily, sink back into soundtrack obscurity. Their Coachella return, however, was strong enough to silence doubters.
True, Dallas draftee Kaela Sinclair is half the compelling addition that Kibby was (her contributions aren’t as deeply felt) and “Do It, Try It”, lead single from just-released seventh album Junk, is a long way from being as catchy as their breakthrough hit. But as a live entity Gonzalez and his cohorts haven’t fallen backward even a step, providing better visuals for this packed polo field appearance than their fellow Frenchmen in Phoenix did once they reached the main stage.
Ringed by levered light sabers and with a Pink Floydian spectral backdrop that surely sucked a good share of stoners into its vortex, M83 drew big and delivered, dynamically (at one point dropping the sound down to almost sonar pings) and with measured nuance for such epic scale. Deftly blending trademark atmosphere and a still-developing knack for grabbing melodies into a seamless experience, Gonzalez’s group reaffirmed its standing as one of the better oversized attractions these days. –Ben Wener
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Rancid
Tim Timebomb and friends may be looking ragged in their old age, but they remain one of the most consistent bands working today. This is the irony that has kept Rancid relevant (OK, mostly relevant) for two decades: The more face tattoos they get, the more professional they seem to become. The band used their afternoon set on the main stage to blast through all the usual hits from 1995’s …And Out Come the Wolves, a record that creeps further into the “punk classic” category with each passing year. Between songs, Armstrong and co-frontman Lars Frederiksen gave their usual schpiel on honor and family, and they even snuck in the title track from last year’s sort-of-comeback album Honor Is All We Know. But this was largely a nostalgia trip, and a reminder that Coachella’s small subset of true punk believers will not go gently into that good night. –Collin Brennan
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Beach House
Ardent followers who crammed in close to the barrier at the Outdoor Theatre just to get a better look at Victoria Legrand’s sparkling black hood and wild eyes could provide a dozen deeper reasons why this return visit from Beach House was so outstanding, be it the noticeable swelling forcefulness that coursed through the set (“Space Song” and “Myth” and “Sparks” benefitted the most) or the sound mix overall, dreamy and sublime. For those of us who lounged toward the back, laying down to gaze at the stars or finding our attention diverted by lights and colors streaking across the perimeter palm trees in hypnotic waves that seemed almost precisely timed to the music, well, the explanation for such a memorable performance was pretty simple: After three days of rushing madness, everything about Beach House’s set made for the perfect comedown. The smart ones stayed for Sia’s stroke of genius, hopefully a slice or two of Miike Snow, and then bounced before Calvin Harris hit play. –Ben Wener
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Run the Jewels
Year-after-year appearances at Coachella are extremely rare. But in the case of fiery rap duo Run the Jewels, a back-to-back booking made sense, as last year’s combustible sets inside Mojave drew overflow crowds and, thanks to guest shots from Zack de la Rocha and Travis Barker, became the talk of the fest. This time commandeering the main stage, Killer Mike and El-P had even more help: a sure shot from Nas on one of his staples, “Made You Look”; a deliciously raunchy turn from Gangsta Boo; a DJ Shadow cameo for their collaborative cut “Nobody Speak”; some more shredding from Gary Clark Jr., wicked during his own set right before RTJ, on closing cut “Angel Duster”; plus, most talked-about of all, a video introduction courtesy of Bernie Sanders, their pick for president.
Fierce as ever before a sea of red bandanas handed out by street teams shortly before their start, rap’s most rewarding pairing in years dropped hard-earned wisdom and relevant social commentary along with ripping new material — and smartly got signature jam “Close Your Eyes (And Count to Fuck)” out of the way fairly fast, quickly quashing hopes of de la Rocha reappearing on the biggest Coachella stage for the first time since Rage Against the Machine reunited in 2007. A first-rate set, yet it still felt lacking compared to the explosiveness of their previous outing here. –Ben Wener
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