Music

Coachella 2015: Festival notes from Day 2

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Coachella 2015
AP

1. Some Coachella mornings, after a tiring day spent hoofing around the Polo Club fields, I need an early act to get me moving when my body and brain are crying out for more rest. On Saturday, that band is Parquet Courts, whose 1:25 p.m. Gobi Tent start time ensures that I’m inside the festival grounds before the big crowds.

The Brooklyn foursome’s set mirrors its recorded output, blending its songwriters’ hook-based indie-pop side with some darker, edgier material from a more post-punk realm. It’s good but not especially gripping live, and mostly, I find myself yearning for a peek at the musicians’ record collection, which must surely include everything from The Feelies to Pavement, judging from Parquet Courts’ variety of sounds. If nothing else, being here this early means minimizing the chances of traffic-snarl headaches as the fest fills up.

2. Speaking of which, egress and ingress have been shockingly smooth from my perspective. Coachella’s parking plan and traffic pattern—legendarily problematic at points over the festival’s 16 years—seem to have been solved once and for all, as far as I can see. Arriving early can mean missing out on a mess getting in, but I’ve stayed till the end both nights thus far, and even leaving at that peak hour, my exit from the lots to the streets has been remarkably headache-free. Here’s hoping I haven’t just jinxed my Day 3 experience.

3. Sometimes, being in the thick of a fervent crowd can make all the difference. That’s the case for me on Saturday, when I work my way deep into the heart of the Mojave Tent for two acts I’ve been relatively ambivalent about to this point.

First: Jungle, a London-based crew that specializes in what might best be described as electronic R&B. It’s fairly interesting conceptually, simultaneously funky and soulful, with robust live instrumentation, but the songs feel fairly same-y to me. Saturday evening, however, that doesn’t matter much amid the full-on dance party that is Jungle’s Coachella appearance, with the packed tent responding enthusiastically not just to single “Busy Earnin’” but also to the rest of the 50-minute set. An undeniably fun time.

Second: Run the Jewels, the acclaimed hip-hop project from producer/rapper El-P and rapper Killer Mike. Though inventive and challenging, the duo’s tunes have a tendency to grate on me, especially some of the noisy production elements and cartoonishly exaggerated lyrics. But here, with barely a foot of free space in any direction around me, RTJ’s intensity feels exciting, and when Rage Against the Machine’s Zack de la Rocha runs onstage to lend vocals to “Close Your Eyes (And Count to F*ck),” it animates the scene further still. A memorable moment.

4. For me, though, Saturday is a slow build to the final act I’ll see, Swans, the experimental brainchild of New Yorker Michael Gira, active in the ’80s and ’90s and resurrected for a second run in 2010. Setting up before a small Gobi Tent crowd, the six-piece band is late finishing its line check, a shame considering Swans, which is known for marathon live performances, only gets 55 minutes tonight.

When the six men do begin, however, they do so with true purpose: Present the Swans experience in a condensed but no less impactful fashion. It doesn’t seem possible, but they pull it off with professional ease. The set is split between two long pieces, both of which start out subdued and then begin building, adding sounds and volume until they reach ear-bursting heights, and then build further. Gira leads the group like a conductor, trading looks with drummer Phil Puleo to move the music through its various phases, and the band hits its final note just as the clock strikes 1 a.m. (aka the Coachella curfew hour). Mission accomplished.

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