Surprisingly this year was my first visit to
Coachella. I had not planned on going and have never been big on music festivals, but this year I made a spontaneous decision to drive down with some friends. The line-up this year included a lot of acts I was excited to see, most of them electronic performers. I had many expectations as to who would blow me away, who would be okay, and who would most likely let me down. For the most part I would say my expectations where all proven to be wrong. Here is the rundown on my Coachella experience and on the performances I saw.
See videosSee photosBLOWN AWAYJusticeOkay, admittedly I actually didn't expect to be blown away by Justice, it was more of a hope. I had seen a DJ set by Justice before In Hong Kong and enjoyed it greatly, but it didn't quite live up to the hype. Their performance at Coachella lived up to the hype and surpassed it by a long shot. I would go so far as to say it was the best performance I have ever seen. The set was compiled of live remixes of their songs, and also what seemed to (hopefully) be previews of some new tracks to come. The stage set, lights, sound, everything was perfect. The only downfall to the experience was the lack of some people's enthusiasm in the crowd. I will never doubt Justice again.
See VideoSimian Mobile DiscoI wasn't sure what to expect of Simian Mpbile Disco's performance. I had seen videos of how the make their music live, circling around mostly analog instruments tweaking knobs. The show started out a bit slow for me, but by the time the build up to Hustler was being played it was totally on. This performance would probably rank in my top 3 performances of this year's line-up, I was totally blown away.
See VideoBoys NoizeSurprisingly it was the smaller, daytime DJ events that had the best vibe. The crowd at these events seemed to be there specifically for the DJ and the music. Boys Noize has impressed me remix after remix, consistently releasing good tracks. I was then even more impressed when he released his full length album
Oi Oi Oi last year. I had high expectations of Boys Boize and they were fully met.
See VideoPLEASANTLY SURPRISED/SHOCKEDHoly F*ckHoly F*ck has never made a big impression on me before this performance. I have had a hard time sitting down and listening to more than just a few tracks of theirs at once. The live performance by these guys completely shocked me, it is truly
live electronic music. The way they sample and loop their music is amazing. I highly recommend seeing them.
Kid Sister, A-Trak & FlosstradamusIt is good to see people making fun, dancey, silly, good hip hop. Kid Sister's performance was pure entertainment. It was fun, light and her music is made for partying. Opening for Kid Sister was the world famous A-Trak who was not surprisingly fantastic, and backing her up was Flosstradamus. I had expected the show to be good, but I was surprised at how good it really was. I would put this performance in my top 5 at Coachella this year.
See VideoHot ChipAgain, I like a track here and there by Hot Chip, but have never been one to listen to an album in one sitting. Going into the show I expected more of a rock show, but what I got was a dance party. During their live performance their music is so much more energetic, bouncy and fun than on their album. It's always nice to gain that much more respect for a band after seeing them live, and that was my feeling after this show.
See VideoLET DOWNSAphex TwinIn my mind Aphex Twin is one of the godfathers of electronic music. With an insane
resume/discography I went into the show expecting to be blown away, instead I ended up leaving early. The music was nothing that I had heard from Aphex Twin before, and sounded painfully generic. Maybe I went in with too high of expectations, but regardless it was a big let down.
MumI am convinced that there are some artists/bands that just don't really work in the Coachella atmosphere. I would say Mum is one of those bands, especially the time of day they played and their order in the lineup. I had just seen Sebastian and Busy P play their sets, and then moving from that into Mum was a difficult transition. Not only that, but I had expected their set to incorporate a much more of an electronic element. I am a big fan of Mum and their electronic, blippy sound, but their set seemed more symphonic than electronic, and truthfully was just pretty boring.
Fatboy SlimI decided to see Fatboy Slim mostly out of nostalgia than anything else, also the fact that in most parts of the world he is regarded as a god in the dance music scene. To me he mostly came off as a creepy old guy still trying to relive the glory from his last solid album that was released 8 years ago. Maybe that comes off as sounding a bit harsh, but really the only thing that intrigued me about his performance was the enormous LCD screens he was DJing on top of. His performance, actions, facial expressions all seemed contrived and hokey.
See VideoOTHER WORTHY MENTIONABLES::
Glitch Mob (Including edIT)
::
Sebastian::
Stars::
Yelle::
Does It Offend You, Yeah?Labels: coachella, festivals, music
Dropbox is a new online service making it possible to easily and seamlessly sync and access your important files over multiple computers. After installing Dropbox the application creates a designated folder on your hard drive, simply drag and drop files into this folder and they are synced with your online account. Installing the application on multiple computers works the same way, except those files are now synced with all computers on your account as well as your online account. This is a great way to make sure you always have current working files if you are on-the-go or away from your computer and the ease-of-use is unmatched by any other option I have tried. Not only does Dropbox sync and backup your files, but you can also create public folders to invite others to collaborate and share files with. At the moment Dropbox is still in beta and only offers 2GB of storage. I am really hoping they offer pay plans with more storage which I am guessing is likely. The service is available for both Mac and PC and works fine over cross platform networks.
