Category Archives: Music

I am so glad that Gogol Bordello is back on the stage again. I saw them last year and they rocked, but I was about to pass out since it was my first time at Coachella.

Now they’ve moved up to bring their awesome gypsy punk and cast of characters (dancers, accordions, singer Eugene Hutz in fabulous purple-striped pants, etc.) to the main stage.

I had a chance to talk with Hutz this afternoon and asked him what made Coachella so different from other festivals.

“It’s kind of more manic,” he said. “Maybe it’s just in the ground out here.”

He also had something to say about moving up from a tent to the main stage.

“This way it really sticks to the ribs,” he said.

Hear what has happened so far at the third day of Coachella.

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I have to say, the security at Coachella has never bothered me until today.

When entering, they tried to confiscate my pens and the guy didn’t seem to understand what a reporter was until his supervisor heard me explaining for a third time and finally let me through, with my evil ballpoints.

Now I just spent five bucks on a frozen lemonade and they won’t let me go to through the gate to the press area with it. Now I can understand bottles and alcohol, but a lemonade? What am I going to do — injure someone with a brain freeze?

I wonder if they’d let me sit in the big easy chair created by the ice bags.

Duffy might be the next Amy Winehouse, without all the drama.

She is making her Coachella debut, and she said it was also her festival debut.

When she had mic problems in the first song, the crowd let her know and she started again, after quipping that she’s never had anybody tell her they couldn’t hear her before.

She was also impressed that the crowd already knew some of her songs.

The thing that always amazes me about Coachella is the sheer number of people dancing in the Sahara Tent at any given time.

Dimitri From Paris has the crowd going insane with his reworking of Marvin Gaye and Tami Terrell’s “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough.”

He’s singing along with the crowd.

Not bad for a guy who got into music from watching American cop shows from the 1970s while growing up in France.

Well, Sean Penn did anyway, but that was expected.

Making his newly scheduled appearance from the Gobi Tent, the crowd quickly jumped to its feet before Penn took the stage. Two kids behind me said, “I’ve never heard this band.” (They didn’t quite get it.)

Launching his “Dirty Hands Caravan” campaign, Penn spoke for about 5 minutes and said it’s time for this generation to give back for the weekend of music they’ve just enjoyed.

Two biodiesel buses are scheduled to leave the Empire Polo Field on Monday at 1 p.m. to make the cross-country trip to New Orleans by May 4.

His speech wasn’t without controversy, though, as he had some words for President Bush they won’t let me print here.

“In either case, the 3,000 lives lost during 9/11 are matched by 4,000 deaths in this criminal war,” Penn said. “We let it happen… but the most powerful third party is you and me.”

About a dozen of those in the audience rushed over to the nearby tent to sign up for the trip that leaves tomorrow. Others were more skeptical.

Meanwhile, the mercury just hit 97 degrees. Though most concertgoers don’t look too affected, one guy lying facedown in the grass by the bamboo waves was a bit questionable.

— John Asbury
jasbury@PE.com

A character from the upcoming PlayStation 3 game “LittleBigPlanet.”

Singing Blur’s “Girls and Boys” at the SingStar tent.

Beyond the Garden, by Oakland artist Michael Christian.

Leaving the polo field during Prince’s set.

The crowd gets divided depending on where they parked.

Discarded flyers for bands and shows litter the ground outside the venue gates.

Photos by Kate Wood/The Press-Enterprise

Austin TV just finished their opening set on the Coachella Stage, and even though the group is from Mexico City, you don’t have to speak the language to appreciate the music, since most of it is sans lyrics.

The band’s Wikipedia entry describes Austin TV as a “post-rock/indie rock band.”

I don’t know that I like post-rock/indie rock music, but I did like them. It was slightly ethereal and haunting, but not disjointed!

It’s like a soundtrack for a dream!

From Austin TV’s Web site about why their music doesn’t have lyrics (I’ve cleaned it up a little bit. The schoolmarm in my head was most insistent):

“It’s because we want to express with the music what words can´t say.
“When we met, we started composing one song and another and we made several songs without thinking if we would have vocals or not, but at the end of the day, we decided that we would rather have the music without voice, and it became a goal for us to make music that doesn´t need vocals.”