If you’ve gone scrolling through your Instagram feed in the last two weeks you defiantly saw photos of SMU students with a cool drink under palm trees or posing in front of giant yellow chairs or a ferris wheel with half a watermelon. Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival attracts festival goers from around the world. Why do SMU students love to attend Coachella? Well since we’re so sad the event is over, we decided to reminisce and talk about our five favorite things.
Lets start with the basics – I mean the name pretty much sums it up for us.
1. The Music
This years performers included Ellie Goulding, Disclosure, JackU, Sia, Guns & Roses, Zedd, with Calvin Harris closing out the weekend. The full line up includes several genres of music and stretches out over more than six stages. Coachella brings together performances from the worlds top recording artists and is one of the only opportunities where you can listen to so much talent over just three days! It doesn’t end there, it has become a Coachella tradition for the larger headlining artist to invite their friends to join them on stage. This year’s guest artists included Lorde, Sam Smith, Rihanna, Kanye, Kesha, Maddie Ziegler and so many more.
Photo by Taylor Hintze
2. The Food
This is a little less obvious but Coachella brings together some of the biggest trends in food, and we all know SMU students and Dallasites like to eat. Coachella not only has a competitive line up for music but to serve your cuisine on the festival grounds is just as huge of an honor. This year the food line up consisted of cuisines from around the world, you could order anything from Haitian style jambalaya to pot stickers and pad thai. There were also a lot of options for the herbivores among us, such as gourmet salads and fresh fruit stands where you could literally purchase half a watermelon or a coconut. If you were enjoying the festival from inside one of the many beer gardens you could enjoy a cold beer with some delicious chicken tenders and fries or a slice of pizza the size of your face.
Photo by Taylor Hintze
3. The Art
Every year Coachella commissions artists from around the globe to create some amazing and gigantic installations for the festival. From the iconic caterpillar that turned to a butterfly on day three or the gigantic spaceman, each year the pieces get larger and more complex. This year Coachella’s Main Stage was the home of four gigantic yellow school desks stacked high with books. As an SMU student missing a day of class on each leg of my trip to Coachella valley I found the artwork taunting of the fact that I was skipping out on classes. However, that leads to my next point.
4. Time for Relaxation
Coachella comes at the perfect time in the school year. SMU students love Coachella because for two weekends right before the school year begins to wrap up and the stress of finals descend upon us, we get to escape to the desert and simply enjoy life. Coachella is like Disney World for teens and young adults, the atmosphere is completely stress free and you can’t help but just enjoy life in the moment.
5. The Social Media
I’d be kidding myself if I left this one out. Coachella is literally one of the most Instagramable experiences of an SMU student’s life. Even though it is only two weeks each year, Coachella is a trending hashtag all 365 days. People look to the festival for that year’s fashion, beauty, and hairstyle trends, and to go to Coachella and not keep you Snapchat feed live and relavent would be a sin. #DoItForTheInsta