COACHELLA 25 CONTINUES TO SET THE BAR

PUBLISHER’S INTRODUCTION: Coachella’s 25th anniversary unfolded as two completely different weekends, each with its own energy and narrative beyond the main stage. Weekend 1 brought elite music and clement weather, while Weekend 2 flipped the script—looser, louder, and packed with surprise moments that carried just as much weight as the headliners themselves. Weekend 2, often seen as the quieter counterpart, ended up delivering some of the festival’s biggest cultural moments. Surprise collaborations took center stage—Madonna with Sabrina Carpenter, Olivia Rodrigo with Addison Rae—while Justin Bieber, who received some harsh criticism for his stripped-down, reflective set weekend 1, owned the night weekend 2 bringing on friends Billie Eilish, SZA, Big Sean, and Sexyy Red. Across the grounds, the cameos kept coming: BLACKPINK’s Lisa with Anyma, Billy Idol and Steve Stevens with Sombr, Snoop Dogg and Teddy Swims joining Giveon, French Montana and Slim Jxmmi with Swae Lee, and a full-on birthday-style takeover in the Mojave with PinkPantheress alongside Janelle Monáe, Zara Larsson, Blood Orange, Slayyyter and more. Add in repeat moments like David Lee Roth popping up with Teddy Swims both weekends, and Karol G closing things out with Peso Pluma, J Balvin, Ryan Castro, Becky G, and Arturo Sandoval – it was clear – Weekend 2 wasn’t the backup plan—it was the payoff.

Joshua Tree Voice is honored to bring you the festival experience through the tenured eyes and ears of Coachella Valley Media Hall of Fame journalist, Bruce Fessier, who has been in attendance of this historied festival since its inception in 1999.

COACHELLAwent multi-generational at this year’s 25^th anniversary festival.

Highlights ranged from septuagenarian rockers Iggy Pop and David Byrne to first-time Coachella artists like the electronic duo, Tomora, and the L.A. indie artist, Blondshell.

Coachella’s international lineup again attracted a multi-ethnic audience, countering persistent stereotypes of the blond, selfie-taking L.A. hipsters. There were more acts from outside of the United States than from within its borders and attendance increased with sell-out crowds of 125,000 a day. Most arrived after sunset despite unseasonably cool daytime weather on Weekend 1 and harsh nighttime winds.

But there were moments after sundown when the Mojave tent felt like its Stagecoach counterpart, the Palomino.

The Palomino became famous in 2014 when Goldenvoice executive Stacy Vee’s began booking aging rockers who regularly raised the canopy roof. Southern rockers Lynyrd Skynyrd opened to the arguably loudest audience in Stagecoach history up to that time and Palm Desert resident Don McLean led a massive singalong to “American Pie” the next day.

Vee was promoted to director of festival talent in 2015 and she continued booking classic rockers in the Palomino at twilight time. Artists from the ‘60s and ‘70s generating deafening roars included the Beach Boys, Tom Jones, Smokey Robinson, Eric Burdon, The Zombies, John Fogerty, Gregg Allman, ZZ Top, the Doobie Brothers, and Sammy Hagar.

But this year, it was Coachella featuring aging rockers blowing the canvas roof off.

Devo, the flower pot hat-wearing, de-evolutionary art band called “the music of the future” in 1979, performed a Friday evening Mojave set that felt like a Palomino headline set. The Ohio natives, led by former Palm Springs resident Mark Mothersbaugh, came out hot with “Don’t Shoot (I’m A Man).” Then they revved their hybrid engine with “Whip It,” “Mongoloid,” and “Jocko Homo.” The only unsatisfying segment came toward the end when they didn’t play their breakthrough version of “Satisfaction.”

Jack White, a 2015 Coachella headliner, carried the Palomino spirit into the Mojave the next afternoon. The 50-year-old singer-guitarist excited an overflow crowd with songs from his old band, the White Stripes, plus “Steady As She Goes” by his next group, the Raconteurs, and two just-released solo songs: the existential “It’s Rough on Rats (If You’re Asking) and “Derecho Demonico.” He finished with an incendiary “Seven Nation Army” — a highlight of his 2003 White Stripes set at Coachella.

To further blur the lines between the modern Coachella and Stagecoach, White was replaced the second weekend by Stagecoach veteran Kacey Musgraves, whose current tour was named co-Country Tour of the Year by industry watchdog Pollstar.

The shirtless, 79-year-old godfather of punk, Iggy Pop, continued the trip back into desert history on Sunday. He didn’t perform any songs from “Post Pop Depression,” his 2016 album with Palm Desert native Josh Homme (who plays with Queens of the Stone Age April 24-25 at the Joshua Tree Retreat and Agua Caliente Rancho Mirage casino, respectively). But he used a horn section to revitalize iconic songs like “Lust For Life,” “The Passenger” and the animal welfare anthem, “I Wanna Be Your Dog.”

Multiple artists have played back-to-back festivals since Stagecoach rolled out of the fertile imagination of Goldenvoice CEO Paul Tollett in 2007. This year, the primary artist doing double duty is pop soul singer Teddy Swims, who featured guest appearances of original Van Halen vocalist David Lee Roth in his two Coachella weekends.

But this year, the vintage Stagecoach rockers have moved to the Mustang, which was resurrected after folding its tent in 2017. They’re actually younger than their Coachella counterparts in the Mojave. Bob Dylan’s son, Jakob, of the Wallflowers is 56 and doing Tom Petty covers. Other Gen X rockers in the Mustang include Bush, Counting Crows, Third Eye Blind, and Hootie & the Blowfish.

Journey, of “Don’t Stop Believin’” fame, is the elder statesman of the Mustang. It’s lone remaining member, guitarist Neal Schon, is 72 – seven years younger than Iggy.

The Palomino is featuring some intergenerational Americana acts. The wry Lyle Lovett and the rootsy country powerhouse Wynonna Judd are baby-boomers sandwiched between under-30 artists, Marcus King, with his Southern rock anthem, “Hard Working Man,” and Sam Barber, who broke out on TikTok with a cover of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Simple Man.”

Both festivals have headliners with crossover appeal. Post Malone has been see-sawing between the two festivals since 2024, when he was second tier on the Stagecoach poster. In 2025, he headlined Coachella and sat in with Stagecoach marquee artist Jelly Roll. Now he’s back on top of the Sunday Stagecoach lineup.

Photos by Brandon Ray Henderson

Coachella headliner Sabrina Carpenter is a pop superstar, and her collaboration with Madonna on Weekend 2 seals her status as pop royalty. But she comes from the songwriting school of her friend Taylor Swift, who played the 2007 Stagecoach. Her arrangements and stage show have massive pop appeal, but she opened her Coachella set with an appearance by modern cowboy icon Sam Elliot. Venturing into country would be a seamless step that could sustain her later career.

But Coachella remains America’s trail-blazing festival, mandatory, said show biz pundit Matt Belloni, “for people in their 30s in Los Angeles.” It is a living, breathing and growing full-sensory experience marked by unique performances.

High on the list is the immersive experience in an underground bunker, “Radiohead Motion Picture House: Kid A Mnesia.” Viewers get to tour a gallery of art and notes related to Radiohead’s 2000 and 2001 LPs, “Kid A” and “Amnesiac,” and view an animated, multi-media, four-sided projection of a film about being “trapped in a derelict museum of the lost and forgotten,” according to Radiohead leader Thom Yorke. It’s intellectually stimulating in the context of the philosophy of Jean-Paul Sarte and Albert Camus on existentialism and the need to embrace the absurdity of life.

Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails, a 2003 headliner, delivered another unique collaboration in the Sahara tent set with German electronic producer Boys Noize as Nine Inch Noize. Their mix of industrial and electronic power built on NIN songs such as the rabid “Closer” and “Come Back Haunted.” The only disappointment was not hearing NIN standards like “Hand That Feeds,” “Head Like A Hole,” and “Every Day Is Exactly the Same.”

Moby also returned to his Coachella roots with a supplemented band, including strings and backup vocalists. I have fond memories of randomly meeting him at the first, less-restricted Coachella in 1999 and having him hand me a copy of his new CD, “Play,” after learning I was a journalist. But his sound on classics from that LP, especially “Natural Blues” with soulful vocals by Jacob Lusk, made his 8:10 p.m. Mojave set more resonant.

Tom Rowlands returned as part of the new duo, Tomora, with Norwegian alt-pop vocalist Aurora after he, too, christened the inaugural Coachella with the Chemical Brothers. Previewing songs from their album, “Come Closer,” released April 17, Aurora didn’t sing lyrically as much as she sang single notes and phrases prompting Rowlands to explore melodic strands and add colors to his powerful electronic rhythms. It was one of the festival’s most underrated sets.

After Tomora, Fatboy Slim (who preceded the Chemical Brothers at the one-day 2001 festival) sounded dated in the Quasar amphitheater in Coachella’s vast southern region

Remarkably, the ‘80s post-punk band, Suicidal Tendencies, led by 63-year-old Mike Muir, sounded amazingly vital. Muir somehow pulled off playing a troubled teen being sent to a mental health facility for “your own best interests” on the teen angst anthem, “Institutionalized.” “What do you mean in MY best interests?” Muir screams.

That band excelled partly because of its three original members and sensational new drummer Xavier Ware. Thundercat sat in on the last three numbers, including “Institutionalized.” The bass great headlined the 2024 Monterey Jazz Festival, but he started with Suicidal Tendencies at age 16 in 2001.

Conversely, the L.A. punk band, Black Flag, was disappointing in the Gobi, especially after hearing Suicidal Tendencies next door in the Mojave. Punk anthems like “Rise Above” and “Six Pack” were fun, but they sounded like a Black Flag tribute band playing with lone original member Greg Ginn.

Byrne, former front man of the Talking Heads and Fatboy Slim partner on their Broadway musical, “Here Lies Love,” sounded timelessly vital. That’s partly because of his Broadway-inspired approach of having his dozen musicians play portable instruments, allowing them to perform choreographed dance moves. Talking Heads songs like “Psycho Killer,” “Once In A Lifetime” and “Burning Down the House” seemed rehearsed like a Broadway show. “Life During Wartime” was accompanied by poignant images of modern-day life during wartime.

Byrne reportedly turned down $20 million to reunite the Talking Heads for Coachella (a dubious rumor I only repeat because I know Tollett admires that band). So Justin Bieber’s $10 million fee to headline two Saturday nights made him Coachella’s highest paid artist, according to several media sites.

But he didn’t provide $5 million-per-weekend performances.

Online rumors abound about why Bieber spent his first half-hour singing songs from his first two albums, “Swag” and “Swag II,” without production and then devoting his next segment to sitting in front of a laptop and singing along to his old hits on YouTube.

Theories include that he was getting back at music managers for selling his catalog to Hipgnosis Songs Capital for over $200 million in December 2022 and exploiting a loophole allowing YouTube to play his material without having to pay his publisher royalties; that he owed Goldenvoice’ parent company, AEG Presents, $20 million-$26 million for cancelling part of a 2023 tour for health reasons and that AEG was getting $10 million back; and that Bieber was going for a “vibe” instead of a typically big Coachella stage production, as L.A. Times pop music critic Mikael Wood wrote.

I don’t believe any of that. I do believe he was interacting with YouTube fans and contrasting his maturity with his old teen idol persona for an online audience since YouTube was broadcasting Coachella around the world. That strategy set social media abuzz across all platforms. The analytics company, BetMGM Casino, said Bieber gained a million new Instagram followers after his performance – the most of any Coachella artist.

But his show was boring. Give me big production anytime.

By contrast, the Times reported Karol G spent months preparing for her Sunday headline set, including three weeks of rehearsals in Las Vegas, costing three times what Coachella paid her. But her spectacular show, featuring a guest appearance by Cuban jazz trumpet legend Arturo Sandoval, who has a home near the festival grounds, was a tribute to Hispanic culture in general. It reflected her appreciation of being Coachella’s first Latina headliner and it was exciting standing among Latinas thrilled to see her on that giant stage saying things they longed to hear, starting with her first number, “Latina Forever.”

Likewise, the electronic artist Anyma spent a year preparing his custom-designed multi-media show, “Anyma presents Aeden,” for a midnight show. It was cancelled the first weekend due to winds but was definitely worth seeing the following Friday.

Cut-off access to ADA parking prevented me from getting into the Empire Polo Club at 11 p.m. to see it live, but viewing it on YouTube’s Coachella TV made the  figure singing Ellie Goulding’s part appear like a figure of Anyma’s imagination on “Hypnotized” while Lisa from Blackpink made an augmented live appearance (adding giant wings!) on “Bad Angel.”

Anyma took the 2012 Tupac Shakur hologram technology into the AI era with giant, eerie Greco-Roman-type images jumping off the stage and into the audience, blurring the line between reality and tricks of the light. Smoke shot out of machines and disappeared into computer-generated images. It was one of the all-time great Coachella performances.

Karol G and Anyma put in the work to make their shows part of the pantheon of past great shows by Lady Gaga, Beyoncé, Daft Punk, and the Tupac hologram. They’re what makes Coachella a cultural phenomenon.

Bruce Fessier is a Coachella Valley Media Hall of Fame journalist who has covered every Coachella and Stagecoach. Contact him at jbfess@gmail.com. Follow him at facebook.com/bruce.fessier