Top 10 Things to Expect at Coachella: The Partying, The People, The Heat!

Luckily for Windsor and me, Intel and the Visual Life Campaign spoiled us rotten by paying for all of our travel, accommodations, and VIP tickets to Coachella this year (they even gave me a camera with which I documented my Visual Life through the below pictures and videos!).  For those who are planning on attending future Coachella’s, or those who want to know what went down at Coachella 2011, here are my top ten things you can expect to happen at Coachella! 
 

10. You can expect to drop mad cash.  Everything within the massive grounds of the Empire Polo Club, where Coachella is held annually, is cash only.  So stock up on the Jacksons, because you’ll need lots of cash to buy tons of bottled water, food (a burger goes for $9), drinks (a cup of Heineken – which, by the way, had a monopoly on the beer offerings – is $9), various other amusement (a spin on the Ferris Wheel is $5) and Coachella merch (starting at $25).  Our friend Steve dropped $130 in one day just on food and drink…phew!
 
9. You can expect your phone to die (but don’t worry!).  Coachella’s six stages are raging for more than twelve hours each day.  Between calling your friends to meet up, checking your text messages, and taking lots of pictures to document the festival, your phone will definitely run out of charge in those twelve hours.  The solution: Coachella offers a “Recharge Bar” with several dozen electric outlets.  Just remember to bring your charger and you’ll be all set!  And one last piece of mommy advice: set a meet-up point with your friends at one of the landmarks at Coachella in case you get separated.
 
8. You can expect to see really cool art and realize that Coachella is, after all, a music AND arts festival.  A lot of the crazy awesome stuff I saw this year was produced as part of The Creators Project, a collaboration between Intel and Vice to bring technology to the forefront in enabling, powering, and presenting new visual experiences.  The Creators Project tent at Coachella showcased dancing Nao robots (see video below), reinvented video games, and a whimsical multisensory project that can only be described as an intelligent punching machine/video projection installation.  At night, massive lighted structures punctuate the skyline: a set of luminescent electronic palm trees, enormous abstract sculptures of insects (trust me, the effect was beautiful, not frightening), a giant ferris wheel, and two unfathomably long (anchored) strings of glowing balloons floating freely to the whims of the breeze.

Giant insect sculptures!
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7. You can expect your nose buds to be assaulted with an astounding variety of mostly terrible smells.  I wouldn’t be telling the full story if I didn’t mention the smells in addition to the sights.  As you enter and exit Coachella, you’ll find the air reeks of horse manure, thanks to the polo club venue.  (I really don’t understand how everyone camping out in their car can stand the smell at night!)  No need to get too detailed here, but the port-a-potties look and smell like plastic versions of the Slumdog Millionaire variety.  Smoke from cigarettes and marijuana saturates the air.  You’ll probably get beer spilled on you.  Everyone will stink of sweat (especially those camping at the grounds, and the most audacious dancers in the crowd).  At least there are also plenty of pretty flowers around that you can elect to smell.

Just a small crowd…
 
6. You can expect to face the question “should I go see Arcade Fire, Paul van Dyk, or (if you’re completely jetlagged as I was) go sleep?!”  A million things will be happening at once, and quite simply, you’ll have to make a decision between a couple equally enticing options.  Navigating the Coachella lineup of close to 200 artists is exactly like figuring out your plan of attack at the outlet mall when it’s two hours to close.  You won’t get to see everything you want, so make the most of what you can fit into your schedule.  Get as close as possible to the stage for your favorite shows and the experience will be worth the opportunity cost!  Finally, don’t pass up the opportunity to get sleep just because you feel a need to get your ticket’s worth (especially if you’re blasé about the band that starts past midnight).

The Interpol show
 
5. You can expect to make some new friends at Coachella.  As mentioned earlier, Windsor and I got to attend Coachella for free this year thanks to Intel and The Creators Project!  There were a couple other bloggers who were also given the same VIP treatment (Kristy from GeekSugar, Shannon from BuzzSugar, and Steve from COED Magazine).  Windsor and I ended up hanging out with Steve the whole time, and we discovered some mutual personal and professional interests (pancakes, photography, people watching, marketing, entrepreneurship).  It made for a great time all around!  Of course, there are other ways to meet new friends at Coachella too – for example, you never know who you might end up striking up a conversation with while standing in the ID check line (and what fake Gucci he might be sporting)…
 

 
4. You can expect someone to faint from heat exhaustion. I happened to be that person this year (probably one of many, actually).  Somehow as I was listening to someone explain the Nao robots to me, I suddenly started losing hearing and vision, stumbled backwards, and was luckily caught by someone as I was fainting from heat exhaustion.  The security guards were at my side literally immediately with a bottle of water.  Within five seconds, I was completely fine again.  Totally bizarre, pretty scary, and I wish I could have seen what I looked like fainting!  Moral of the story: hydrate, hydrate, hydrate!  Despite going through half a dozen bottles of water that day, I only went to the bathroom twice.  Your body needs that water when the temperature’s 90+!

At this show, the performers were actually spraying people with water to cool them down (and to get the party started!)
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3. You can expect to be amazed by your fellow man, in more ways than one.  Let me list just a few ways other festival-goers amazed me at Coachella 2011: some people were extraordinarily…err…shall we say “hyper and happy.”  Some people were dressed in full head-to-toe gear despite the 90+ degree weather (I’m talking bunny mascot costumes, and skintight gold pleather bodysuits – see Windsor’s posts on the best Coachella fashions and what to wear); others wore close to nothing at all.  But most amazing to me was seeing upwards of 70,000 attendees sway and sing and dance to the same music together for hours – perfect strangers, most of them, but all equally in love with the same bands.  For example, each time Afrojack started spinning up the very first riff of a new track during his show, the crowd would roar in recognition and start jumping in unison.  It was honestly very moving and surreal to be in the midst of this musical fraternity.  I felt as though my heartbeat, and that of everyone around me, had been replaced with the cool thump-thump of the kick drum.
 

Dancing at the Afrojack show!

2. You can expect to “discover” a new favorite band.  Windsor’s friend recommended that we see The Black Keys (a rock band consisting of a singer/guitarist and drummer from Akron, Ohio) at Coachella.  We found a great spot where Windsor was able to see what was going on and where I was able to see people’s heads in front of me.  Fortunately, I could also see the big screen and could clearly hear The Black Keys play.  They were absolutely incredible musicians (that voice! that phenomenal drumming!) and both Windsor and I fell in love with their sound.  Same story with another band I will now follow – Radio Department (a dream pop group out of Sweden).  Of course, as I later Wiki’ed, The Black Keys and Radio Dept are not new, and each are already many people’s favorite band.  But I personally discovered these guys for the first time, and that’s what Coachella is for!
 

At the Black Keys show!
 
1. You can expect that, at the end of the day, Coachella will crush your expectations.  I wish I had brought shorter shorts (did I mention it was over 90 degrees?), higher headpieces (instead of my white sunhat, I really should have gone for a feathery headdress, like the gal below – I was not prepared for the amount of self-expression evident everywhere at Coachella, and wish I was more creative), and more massive memory cards for my camera (your SD card and battery pack are really the limiting factor for what can/should be documented).  None of the previous nine “you can expect” items were things I actually fully expected, and I’m sure the same would be true for any other non-veteran of Coachella.  So to wrap up, I will list a few of the things I saw that truly made me gawk this year at Coachella:

• A guy dressed in nothing but a Borat swimsuit
• The sickest light show I’ve ever seen on the Coachella main stage (see video below)
• Pizza by the slice, sold for $7 a slice (painful!!)
• From car drop-off point to Coachella main stage is an insane 45 minute walk (please, leave the heels at home for this one, collegiettes™!)

And that’s all, folks!  Thanks again to Intel for an amazing weekend!