New Sound Now // An online music show and blog

It’s been nearly three years since I took my pilgrimage to Indio, California, in search of a festival that seemingly never disappoints in delivery. The 2005 Coachella festival was a landmark occasion for me, not only because it was my first time in California, my first time seeing more than 50 bands play in a weekend, and my first piece of proper music journalism. It was my entrance exam to the sunlit realm of the world of indie music. Oh, I’d dabbled. My CFRE radio show “Let’s Rave On,” which spawned my 60-column set on Inside Pulse through 2005-07, acted as my introductory tour of the music available. It allowed me to sample, experiment, and wade in the waters. But Coachella blew the roof open. After that weekend, I would never again listen to mainstream radio, never again buy a mainstream CD from a nationwide outlet store, and never by considered anything less than a pretentious music snob to my peers.

Every January since then, I’ve eagerly awaited the poster for the concert. I’d been introduced to so many bands in 2005, the list would surely steer my playlists for the coming year. 2006 and 2007 did that, to a certain extent. Though I knew more of the artists involved, there were always a couple gems that were unearthed for me.

This year was no different. The poster came out yesterday, and as if it was Christmas day in indie-land I opened my browser and arrived at the Coachella.com main page to find it awash in ethereal blue. The poster lay on the right side. It was full, another three-days filled with every conceivable touring band this summer.

There have been major complaints as to this years’ lineup, that it isn’t as impressive as years past. I thought this initially, and do think they’re guilty of one thing: Coachella’s promoters are still just as good at keeping their fingers on the pulse of what people want to hear, but they haven’t kept up with exactly how fast the people on the internet can go through music. In 2005, I didn’t know 80% of the roster. This year, I don’t know about 30%. That isn’t really a knock on Coachella’s promoters. It’s in fact a compliment to me and everyone else who don’t think that there are enough blowaway bands on the bill; we’ve simply become better at finding and digesting music. We’re cynics. Nothing short of a Clash reunion with a zombified Joe Strummer would have made all of us happy.

Now, the three headliners do kind of stink. Jack Johnson is asshole filled pabulum. Roger Waters is only part of a band that we’d want to see (and I’ve never really been a Floyd fan, to be honest). Only Portishead, this year playing the over-seas big band (ala Bjork last year) suffices as a proper headlining act. But one must remember that the headlining acts are never the reason to go to Coachella. Please, Coldplay headlined 2005, only to be bested mainstream overkill by RHCP last year. The real headliners are the bands that still show up in large font, just below the big three. These bands –The Verve, The Raconteurs, Kraftwerk, Death Cab For Cutie, Love and Rockets, and My Morning Jacket — are what should be considered the big names of the show.

More importantly, as with any festival, is the undercard. How good or bad one believes the undercard to be is absolutely a matter of how on top of the new music scene you are. If you’ve seen or heard to death this list of artists, then you are likely organizing festivals yourself already. Personally, while I’ve heard of the majority of bands, I’ve only seen three or four live (is it me or is Tegan and Sara a permanent resident of the festival?) and would love to check the rest off the list.

I began this morning kind of disappointed at the list, but as I dwell on it, the prospect seems more and more likely that I’ll be championing this list of artists by the weeks end.