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| The Mobile Butterfly: Coachella 2015's most enduring art exhibit! |
Let’s start with a truism – all reviews are subjective - and
with a mega-fest like Coachella, that subjectivity is further limited by the fact that at best,
any one individual can only witness about one-fourth of the total musical experience.
But out of multiple reviews, hopefully a more
complete picture grows, so here are my down and dirty thoughts on what I caught Week 2 of
Coachella 2015, my 8th consecutive year in attendance.
WEEKEND 2'S BEST ACTS
1. AC/DC - An unexpected but in retrospect perfect old-timer headlining choice - the band couldn't have sounded better, brought out all of their arena show production tricks, and while Brian Johnson may have lost a step (though he's lost nothing with his voice), Angus remains a spry little elf whose gymnastic grounds crossing solos proved endlessly entertaining. Possibly the greatest big dumb rock band of all time did not disappoint. Nigel Tufnel would have been nothing but proud!
2. STEELY DAN - Sure, there's a reason these guys came up as studio musicians...Walter Becker may look like a nerdy Pixar animator, and watching Donald Fagen live at the piano is like watching a troubling Randy Newman/Ray Charles lab experiment gone wrong - but damn, can these guys play, and their hour long set included almost all of their biggest songs. At a festival renown for it's great sound, this was the best sounding set of all.
3. SWANS - Fifty-five minutes is for too short for a proper Swans set, arguably the best live band in the world at the moment...but the post rock legends still brought their A+ game, thrilling with thirty minute opener Frankie M, the opening moments of To Be Kind's Bring The Sun, and an astounding rendition of another new track Black Hole Man.
4. ST. VINCENT - Annie Clark's transformation over the years from compelling Heroin-chic indie belle to Bowie caliber freakazoid has been amazing to watch, and she was in absolute command for this electric, whacked-out fifty minute set drawing heavily from latest and best album, the self-titled St. Vincent
5. LYKKE LI - Always an intense, riveting performer, this swedish indie-pop goddess probably delivered the best orchestrated front-to-back set of the weekend, starting with latest album I Never Learn's quieter songs of heartbreak before crescendoing with massive performances of previous album Wound Rhyme's garage-y rockers Rich Kid Blues and Get Some.
Honorable Mentions: Brant Bjork And The Low Desert Punk Band, The War On Drugs, Caribou, Parquet Courts, St. Paul And The Broken Bones, Royal Blood, Kasabian, Sloan, Saint Motel, Florence + the Machine.
WEEKEND 2'S BEST SINGLE SONGS
1. SUN - CARIBOU - The single most massive moment I've experienced a Coachella since Sigur Ros ' Saturday night closer two years back in 2013. Always an elite master of volume manipulation - words just do not do justice to how explosive this simple, repetitive closing number played.
2. CLUB FOOT - KASABIAN - Talk about raising the roof - best crowd energy at any moment of the festival.
3. BLACK HOLE MAN - SWANS - already mentioned. Amazing song.
4. LET THERE BE ROCK - AC/DC - The Angus guitar solo that wouldn't end and crossed the grounds. Solo started with Angus on stage, continued as he moved over to a levitating platform 200 feet deep in the audience, then kept going as he ran back stage then continued soloing from the roof of their set as fire cannons burst all around him - the jam had to have gone on for 12-15 minutes and never wavered. The type of literal and figurative live fireworks you just don't get from today's younger musicians.
5. GET SOME - LYKKE LI - Another track that just swelled to epic portions before it concluded. Fabulous set closer.
Honorable Mentions: Low Desert Punk - Brant Bjork, Fergus Gallery - Allah-Las, Seagull/Vapour Trail - Ride, Eyes To The Wind - The War On Drugs, I Never Learn - Lykke Li, Aja/Reelin' In The Years - Steely Dan, Back In Black - AC/DC, Borrowed Time - Parquet Courts, Figure It Out - Royal Blood, Busy Earnin'/Time - Jungle, Doorbell - Jack White, Type - Saint Motel, Carry The Zero - Built To Spill, Wrecking Ball - Ryan Adams, Huey Newton/Your Lips Are Red - St. Vincent, Cosmic Love - Florence + The Machine.
And now for the each day's action in a little more detail!
FRIDAY
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| Steely Dan delivers a bucket list performance Friday Night on the Outdoor! |
Friday got off to a satisfying but unspectacular start. Only the sparsely attended 12:55 pm Outdoor Theatre set from former
Kyuss drummer Brandt Bjork and the Low Desert Punk Band delivered A+ fireworks. And unfortunately after
seeing just his two incendiary opening songs, I left to catch a bit of the
slightly disappointing Eagulls, who let the drone in their drone heavy post-punk songs overpower their otherwise solid set.
Earlier that day, Los Rakas kicked things off to a spirited
start with their energetic, Latin hip hop, and the Sean Lennon-fronted
The Ghost Of A Saber Tooth Tiger delivered some tasty Revolver/Tame Impala
flavored psychedelia. Britian’s Ruen
Brothers were less effective, with their Elvis impersonator-like vocals marring
an otherwise well performed set.
Amoeba records product the Allah-Las were second best of the
early daytime acts. Their 60s garage
rock isn’t exactly high energy, but they have that early Stones/Animals sound down cold, and actually have a some very accomplished
songs too boot. Enjoyed their set quite
a bit. The Reverend Horton Heat did his
thing a touch earlier in the Mojave, but can’t say I was blown away…it was a
well rendered pyschobilly set – nothing more, nothing less. Rounding out
Saturday was an absolutely dreadful Ab-Soul (worst rap beats I’ve ever heard
live), and a slightly disappointing
Charles Bradley – who while solid didn’t quite deliver the ecstatic soul
highlights of previous Coachella soul acts like Vintage Trouble, Black Joe
Lewis & The Honeybears, and Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings. Still, it was great to see this lifer whose
career finally broke for him so late in the game get his moment in the
spotlight.
After a break for dinner, Friday picked up big time, and
ended up being one of my favorite eight hour stretches of any year of the festival.
English shoe gazers Ride starter things off with a
fine late afternoon Gobi set that got a little flat in the middle but was marvelously
bookended by Nowhere tracks Seagull and Vapour Trails. The War On Drugs took things to the next
level with their 6:05 mainstage set, with Lost In A Dream cut Eyes Against The
Wind's long instrumental wind down just the perfect accompaniment to the sun setting behind the
mountains. From there, Friday night only got better…after
a couple of tasty songs from blues rockers Alabama Shakes, it was off to the
Mojave, where Lykke Li delivered what I've already mentioned as the 2015 fest's best sequence set…her singer-songwriter cuts from latest album I Never Learn played much larger and more dynamic live than on record, then
gave way to the increasingly awesome garage rockers that dominate her second
and best release Wounded Rhymes. She’s been scaling back on performances this year…but after this show, I would see her again in a heart beat.
Things got better still as we moved to the aforementioned Outdoor Theatre set by Steely Dan. All I can say is what a treat, from a band I never thought I'd see in my lifetime…No Rikki or Do It Again, but
they played just about everything else I most wanted to hear, and their take on the
full ten minute version of Aja was to die for.
After that, things got electronic. First, the end of Caribou…only caught
one song, Sun, but as I already said, the best single song performance of the
entire festival. An unforgettable performance. Todd Terje followed with a funky rendition of
his playful debut It’s Album Time, performed with live accompaniment almost straight in sequence. No Bryan Ferry guest appearance for Frankie and Johnny as in Week 1, but still a fine
dance/electronic set.
Finally, it was time for AC/DC, who acquitted themselves
like the absolute veteran pros they are…delivering crystal clear, spot on
performances of all their biggest hits.
It’s funny, I was a teenager when they broke out in the 80s, and I
thought they were just a dumb hard rock band at the time. I still think that, but the years have been
very kind to their music, and in retrospect, thought formulaic, it’s a formula
that just works. Angus in particular was in fine form (see my Let There Be Rock comments above)…Probably one of the 10-15 sets I’ve ever seen at Coachella, and the
best headlining set since the Stone Roses/Blur double bill back in 2013. A great way to end the night.
SATURDAY
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| Swans kills in Saturday's finest set! |
Prior to arrival, Saturday, the most rock heavy day on the lineup, seemed a
sure bet to be my favorite, but due to a number of slightly
disappointing sets and a comparable lack of stylistic variety (much the result of my own set choices, admittedly), it ended up being my least favorite day of the 2015.
That said, teenage African-American sibling punk trio Radkey
got things off to a fun start with a enthusiastic and impressively polished
(given the band’s age) Ramones-like set.
Until The Ribbon Breaks, an up-and-coming electro-soul act
provided no such thrills. This is the market dominant/overplayed genre of the
moment, and this band showed no advancement on the form, instead they just seemed like another act jumping on the "what sells today" bandwagon. To their defense, I
only stayed for about ten minutes, but those ten minutes I did see were among the
dullest ten minutes I caught all day.
PHOX on the other hand, was wonderful. It’s funny how as the years pass and different genres
come to dominate the lineup, one gets
sick of them at their peak as they overpopulate the schedule, but as they drift out of vogue, and make up a smaller portion of the bill, as richly instrumented indie and hard rock do now, they begin to sound
absolutely essential. Wisconsin's PHOX was one of
just a few pure indie-sounding acts, and I found myself loving the density of
their instrumentation and lead singer Monica Martin's voice.
UK Synth-rock anthem-ers COASTS brought things back to more familiar 2015
territory. Their set was well performed,
but I can't say I found their music to be anything more than guilty pleasure
generic. Ditto for Americana act Jamestown Revival.
Then it was time for the day’s first high-priority act, Brooklyn’s highly
adventurous art-punkers Parquet Courts. This was one of my favorite sets of
the day, but it should have been better. Not through any fault of the band, but
because Goldenvoice was a year late to this party. When a young band delivers a Top 50 of decade
caliber album as Parquet Courts did in late 2013 with Light Up Gold…you don’t wait for the next
release, you book them on the spot. But
Coachella did wait, and two decent but lesser releases later, when the band
finally shows up, it’s with a significantly diminished set
list. Which is a shame, because while Ducking and Dodging, Pretty Machines,
Bodies Made of and a few of their more recent other songs are all solid, they were no match live
for the one two punch of Light Up Gold openers Master Of My Craft and Borrowed
Time – two of the days best single song performances – to think if they had
been booked the previous year that set list would have also included Stoned And
Starving, Donuts Only, North Dakota and Tears O’Plenty only brings frustration over how
great it could have been. Regardless,
this was still one of the day’s best sets.
St. Paul And The Broken Bones were even better–
a white soul act fronted by a pudgy, bespectacled Harry Carry look-alike
who is nonetheless a wowzer of a front man, armed with a voice to rival Otis Redding or
Al Green. Just a great tear down the roof soul set –
exactly what I had hoped Charles Bradley would be the day before.
British drums and bass due Royal Blood kept the fireworks
going with an overpowering, Zeppish set – hits Figure It Out and Little Monster
were fantastic – and the rest of their tracks played equally huge. These guys feel destined, along with St. Paul
and Sunday’s Saint Motel, to be placing their names much higher on the poster
in upcoming years.
After that it was punk legends
Bad Religion, quite good in the 30 minutes I caught (though a little of their always the same sounding catalog goes a long way), and Jack White
protege, African-American garage rocker Benjamin Booker, who was solid, but underwhelming
when compared to what Parquet Courts, St. Paul, Royal Blood, and Bad Religion
had laid down the previous two hours.
U.K. electro-soul act
Jungle closed out the daytime hours in fine fashion. They’ve got an interesting take on the genre,
driven by group harmonies rather than a dynamic front person, and for the first
two-thirds of their set, this was a slight issue. Staged with their four vocalists side-by-side up front,
there was little room for the band members to move around, making for a fairly static set, but towards the end, when they hit their best songs, especially the closing double whammy of Busy Earnin’ into Time, none of that mattered. The vibe in the tent became electric. One of the day’s best moments.
Following Jungle, I caught a couple of minutes of Belle
& Sebastian on the Outdoor (whom I had seen in a full a few days earlier in a delightful set at
the Fox Theatre, Pomona, California, performance), then it was off for sudden
rap superstars Run The Jewels in the Mojave. I’ve been tracking on this act
since their inception, and after seeing act member Jamie Meline play Coachella
twice before to near empty tents, once with his ground breaking 90s act Company
Flow, and again under his solo moniker El-P in 2013, it was great to see him
playing in front of a packed, enthusiastic tent. But I can’t say I loved the show. Jamie and Killer Mike had great energy, and
their rapping was first rate, but the mix in the tent was way too heavily
weighted towards the vocals…to the point where the beats were all but
non-existent, a shame since their beats are fantastic. Still a solid performance, and the fans
seemed to love it.
I only caught about 20 minutes of Alt-J, a middle portion of
the set that started with their latest album’s best track Left Hand Free, and
ended for me with their first album’s best track Tessellate. Bathed in neon green lights, the band was
hard to see, but no matter…Alt-J is an "all about the sound" type of band, and
though a very interesting act to put on the mainstage at this time of night,
given how quiet much of their music is, their sound was fantastic in that way
only the Coachella Mainstage on a calm desert night can deliver.
British dance-rock superstars Kasabian were up next,
delivering their propulsive update on the Stone Roses’ classic paisley
Madchester sound, and they were freakin' fantastic…one of the weekends true peaks. A
Glastonbury-caliber headliner back in the U.K., their ability to overwhelm a
crowd was blatantly apparent, and by the time they hit their all-time best
track Club Foot midway through their
set, the crowd was ecstatic. Not sure
why they haven’t caught on in the states, other than that they are a rock act
in an era where America’s youth doesn’t listen to rock acts, but if you get a
chance to see them at a festival this year…do not skip their
set. This band
just knows how to thrill on stage.
From a 2015 peak to one of the weekend’s biggest
disappointments: Jack White’s Saturday night headlining set.
To his credit,
Jack came out gun’s blazing,, opening with a hard rocking cover of Elvis
Presley’s Power Of My Love then
segueing into the jammy instrumental High
Ball Stepper. But the fitful,
stuttering, stop-and-start nature of High
Ball Stepper would prove to be the defining characteristic of the entire
show. Until main set closer My Doorbell,
it felt like no song was allowed to just play, every song had to break off
every minute into some instrumental detour. Many people I spoke to afterwards loved
it, but for myself and my friends, the show never developed any sort of
momentum, and the endless instrumental breakdowns grew increasingly tedious as the show went on despite the abundant talent of the players on stage. Things got more
streamlined during the encore, which included Fell In Love With A Girl, Steady
As She Goes, Sixteen Saltines, Ball and Biscuit, and Seven Nation Army, and it
was easily the best part of the show, just not enough to fully overcome the
negative impressions that had been forged over the eighty minutes prior.
Following Jack White, I closed the night with the back-to-back
extremism of 90s hardcore legends Drive Like Jehu and overpowering post-rock
gods Swans. Both shows were sparsely attended…just a few hundred at each. Jehu was decent but unspectacular. Swans were staggeringly good, despite some
withering, Whiplash-style nastiness band leader/crazy person Michael Gira was throwing
at pedal steel guitarist Christoph Hahn after Hahn ran off stage early to grab
the stool the roadies had forgot to put out for him. Only time for two and a half songs – Frankie M, the opening few moments of Bring The Sun, and then an amazing Black Hole Man, but it was without
question the best set of the day and a riveting way to end the night.
SUNDAY
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| St. Vincent's Annie Clark takes weird to new heights in Sunday's best set! |
Despite being arguably the lest impressive day on paper,
Sunday 2015 proved to be quite a winner, particularly during the early hours,
which delivered a number of excellent performances with a wonderful eclectic
flow.
Canadian veteran power poppers Sloan jump started the day with the best opening set of the weekend. I’m not that familiar
with their music, so don’t remember the song titles, but there was a three song
stretch smack dab in the middle of their forty minute set that just
killed. Bottom line, as I’ve said in
years past, never sleep on the old timers – experience counts.
Sometimes - next up was Blake Sennett of Rilo Kiley’s latest
project Night Terrors of 1927, another anthem-y, slightly 80s leaning act like
Coasts the day before. Also like Coasts,
the performances were impressive, but in service of songs that didn’t wow.
After catching a few tracks, I moved on…to much better things.
Chicano Batman, a hard to pin down Mexican act that combines
elements of Mariachi, garage, psychedelia, jazz, and folk were loose and chill
– a great way to kill a few minutes in the early outdoor sun, and then Chapman
College’s young Saint Motel were nothing short of awesome. Blending a Franz Ferdinand-ish approach with
old time Cuban/Caribbean/Tropicalia accents, the performed their joyous music
with the assistance of six costumed dancers.
The entire set was just loads of fun, and by the time the band
closed with their massive single Type, the small but enthusiastic crowd was
ecstatic. Another one of the week's best shows.
Following that – I scrambled over to catch what was left of
Angel Olsen’s set. The answer, not much, and her closing with White Fire, my
least favorite track off of her breakthrough LP Burn Your Fire For No Witness,
was a slight disappointment. But her voice
was amazing, probably the finest to grace the fields this year…so still a
very solid set.
Two very young (just out of their teens) impressive
punk/garage acts were up next – Torrance California’s Joyce Manor on the
Outdoor, and suburban Chicago act The Orwells on the Main Stage. The Orwells,
with their Black Lips bad-boy vibe and devil-may-care front man Mario Cuomo,
seem to have the higher commercial upside, and were a lot of fun in their best
moments, but Joyce was the better of the
two acts on this day…tighter, more consistent…in truth it was a very a strong
performance for an act this young. Maybe the fact they were playing in front of
a huge contingent of their neighborhood friends had something to do with it.
Panda Bear was a nice chill-out alternative following. I’ve never been a huge fan of his or Animal
Collective’s noodle-y electro-pychedelia, and watching a non-emotive singer
standing like a statue at a sequencer for forty minutes is hardly my idea of
live performance fun, but I have to admit, on this day, I found his set
pleasant and relaxing, and really got into the trippy videos he had playing
behind him.
Emerging country-superstar Sturgil Simpson was Coachella’s one
country crossover act. Hope he drew a
much larger crowd the following week at Stagecoach…because while his Coachella crowd was meager, he was quite good, showing a versatile command of a number of country/bluegrass styles. His uptempo numbers in particular played strong.
Built To Spill was my first of only two must sees Sunday. Always a
fan of their recorded output, I’d never seen them before…but I can’t say they
wowed. Carry The Zero
was awesome, it's ending jam pure bliss, and a few other killer instrumental breaks peppered the set…but
overall, this one felt a little sleepy and uninspired, an effect that was
amplified when they chose to close this weekend with Randy Describes
Eternity instead of my all time BTS favorite Goin’ Against My Mind, which they
had played the week before.
Jon Talabot justified my one foray into this year’s version of the Yuma
tent. I'm a fan of him on record, but he was playing purely for the dance crowd here...just grooves, not songs…so
only stuck it out for about fifteen minutes.
Jenny Lewis proved to be a pleasant enough set as the sun
started to fade, working a cross of material from her solo and Rilo Kiley
output. Then England's The Cribs proved to be one punk act too many for me – wasn’t in the mood for any more straight ahead bar chord rock. I
stuck around for about 25 minutes, but couldn’t get into it.
Ryan Adams on the Outdoor under the last wisps of daylight
proved to be the perfect antidote – one of my favorite sets of the day –
especially on new ballad Wrecking Ball, which was just gorgeously
rendered. Had a fun call out to the
Grateful Dead’s Bob Weir also, who was watching from the sound booth. (A move Adam’s apologized for a few minutes
later after half the crowd turned around and started snapping pictures).
Following Ryan it was off for one of the weekend’s weakest sets, courtesy of Radiohead drummer Philip Selway, making a rare trip to the
front of the stage. Gotta think this
booking was 90% about retaining good will with the band to secure a third
Radiohead headlining slot in next year or two…cause as a front man, Philip
makes a very good drummer. Would have been perfectly fine at a local coffee house, but by Coachella standards....
Sunday closed with a fine pair of female-fronted acts – St.
Vincent, and the recently hobbled Florence + the Machine (Flo had broken her
foot jumping from the main stage the week before.) St. Vincent killed it. I’ve seen her all three times she’s come to
Coachella, and her transformation from intriguing, strong voiced ingenue to the
commanding, guitar shredding, Bowie-esque freak that took the stage this night
is astonishing. Working primarily from
latest, fourth, and best LP, the self-titled St. Vincent, St. V was a tiny-stepping joy to watch start to finish. Easily the day’s best set.
Florence followed with a modified acoustic set to play more
to her immobile status, and right away, I could tell this was going to be a much
better show than her Outdoor closing set of 2012. I think being made to sit forced the super energetic performer to focus on her singing…prone
to pitchiness, I’ve never heard her in better voice. Though scheduled for only 30 minutes, she
ended up going a full forty-five, including a duet of Gram Parsons Love Hurts
with guest Father John Misty. All in all
a fitting end for my 2015 version of the the festival.
Actually, I stuck around for Drake, but he was so dreadful I refuse to consider him as the festival's final act. In
all seriousness…in my eight years of attending, there has never been a worse
headlining performance. As mailed in as mailed in gets.
And that's it for 2015 - if you were there, and have anything to add...please feel free to comment below.
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| Coachella 2015 nears the end! Another fine edition to the festivals legendary history! |
