Coachella...

Post-Concert Depression and Reflection

3 days. 36.3 Miles. Bloody Blisters. Hour-long shuttles. $20 beers. Lots of mushrooms. Making and sustaining sensual eye contact with strangers who I’ll never see again but whom I’m pretty sure I’m in love with.

There was also a great deal of body contact with random ravers. Whether it was to get in and out of the crowds, all festival goers agree to a widely understood rule of brushing up against people without intention but because of circumstance. There’s not really any sort of consent, and you rarely get an apology if it happens to you and you seldom say sorry if you do it to someone else. You just reposition your feet at an angle so that when you’re swaying back and forth you won’t graze their bicep or butt, again.

Speaking of feet, I’d suggest investing in the ugliest and most comfortable pair of sneakers. Completing the outfit is not as important as personal comfort and your heels and ridges will be indescribable pain if you choose an Instagram flick over your health. 

The crowds were massive. If you’re unlucky, late, or witnessing a great performer, you’ll be like sardines in a can. If you’re smart, you’ll be like ants on a log—semi-decently sparsed. 

Veterans keep it to themselves but the key is time management and urge control. Keeping your phone battery alive, resisting the temptation to use it beyond the periodic glance at your clock. Practice self-control or carry around a portable charger. Take your pick. 

Learn how to make sacrifices. Sometimes you’ve waited all day to hear Willow Smith and you know she’s going to play 9.

The one song that really saved you all those lonely, quarantine nights in Chicago. However, it’s second to last on her set list and you will be stuck in a massive crowd that is attempting to migrate if you don’t leave her set at least four songs from the finale. Learn to make peace with appreciating art from afar. Listen to her echoes in the distance as you leave the crowd and head to another. 

Either that or you get in deep. You grab the backpack of the person in front of you, get in your congo line of twenty-five people, and wiggle your way through thousands of people in the dark— because the best performers are usually slated in the evening. And that’s a subjective statement so I’ll say, the most commercially successful or widely respected artists get the evening slots. 

Being in the heartbeat of Metro Boomin, a veteran producer of some of the 2010's biggest hits, was exhilarating beyond comparison. And when I did compare his set to the others I witnessed, there was a clear winner. 

Rap gives me adrenaline and drive. It gets the people going and is similar to Rock and Roll in that regard. When I’m low, it gets me hyped. And it was wonderful that his performance was on a Friday because it set the tone for the rest of the weekend. The Weeknd, Don Toliver, Future, and Offset were all guest appearances that complimented the set and made the fans feel like their time was being valued. 

This brings me to a place where I don’t want to be: talking shit. Because, how could you not value your fans? How could you pull out of a performance that working-class people have spent thousands of their hard-earned money trying to see? 

Frank Ocean was the only reason I bought a ticket in the first place. I thought the lineup was subpar and that he was their major selling point and so it didn’t matter to me the cost, as long as I got to see him. Then he dropped out of Weekend 2 and I felt like someone broke up with me. 

And that is what music does. It provides the listener with these feelings we knew we had but couldn’t describe. Or it reminds us that we were actually sad when we thought we were angry. And this all comes from a single person or a band or an ensemble, a set of lyrics, the sound of some melodies, the stack of harmonizing vocals, maybe the vocal arrangement, etc.

These musicians and performers hold up a mirror to you, grab your hand and cry with you. We form these attachments to songs and to these singers or rappers and we form bonds. It’s naive of us to do this; to fall in love with people we don’t know, but we do it time and time again.

Another lesson: stop worshipping celebrities in any capacity. They aren’t some of the best singers, they’re some of the most fortunate. The best singer in the world is probably belting siren-quality, hypnosis-inducing ballads in the middle of a field in the heat of Malaysia. Undiscovered and cutting papayas from trees on her elderly grandparents' massive farm. 

All of them are the same. They’re rich people who look down (literally) at their massive audiences claiming the glory for themselves. And sure I’ll be a sympathizer, some of them try to look into our eyes as they sing at us with the help of auto-tune. But for most, it’s all an act and when those curtains close, it’s like a director yelling cut as the actors revert back to themselves. 

Forgive my cynicism but maybe it’s just me. Maybe this weekend was about more than the music. It clearly was since I went despite Frank Ocean not being there. I had the opportunity to sell my ticket and I didn’t. I suppose I needed an escape. I wanted more freedom. I wanted to release my daily obligation of being a human and participating in society. I wanted to be a free man. 

Nothing there was free and I spent hundreds of dollars, so in a way I played myself, but that’s the price of being allowed to play pretend as an adult. It was nice to dance like no one was watching and be around people who I’d never cross paths with again. It allowed me to be more authentic. It dared me to be more honest with myself. It reminded me of when I moved from LA to Chicago and how excited I was to leave everything behind. How happy I was to leave myself behind. Having multiple identities is a burden I carry. One that I wish to be rid of someday. 

I remember being left behind at a point by my friends. Someone had tapped my shoulder to take her picture and they had gone into a crowd while I was her personal photographer. I turned around and couldn’t find them and began to fret. Then it started to sink in that this was my best-case scenario. Being alone in a crowd of hundreds of people and not being noticed or perceived.

I received several buzzes on my phone from my friends asking where I had gone and I remember feeling the mushrooms but also purposefully not responding immediately. Finally being given the time to be a nobody. Coachella was good to me for providing that temporary escape. Now, I’m back in the valley, doing real life, and all I wish is that I could be lost in an endless sea of people. 

What is it about real life with real people that induces anxiety? Shouldn’t the people you know feel like home? And what if they feel like a cage, instead? What if you feel more comfortable around strangers? What if it feels good to trust someone you don’t know? What if it makes you happier going into the unknown? What happens when you prefer the unfamiliar? How do you reconcile these emotions when you shouldn’t feel them? How do you make sense of it all? Why does it feel so good to be a nobody? Because if nobody wants you, you’re free. 

I saw the following performances and artist’s in this order: (Friday) Nora En Pure, Idris Elba, Burna Boy, Kaytranda, HER, Metro Boomin, The Weeknd, Future, Don Toliver, Offset, Bad Bunny, (Saturday) Kenny Beats, Rosalia, Tale of Us, Erick Prydz, Calvin Harris, (Sunday) Gordo, Porter Robinson, Latto, Kali Chis, Fisher + Chris Lake, Fred Again.., Four Tet & Skrillex.