CoacHELLA LAME 2009

Five reasons I will not be attending Coachella in 2009…or ever:

1. I hate multi-stage concerts and mega-concert venues. Sure, lots of acts in one place seems like a cool thing and a sweet deal, but frankly, I don’t like crappy bands and I generally don’t like people, and there are far too many of both at a show like this. Quantity is not the same as quality.
2. A show can’t be all things to all fans. Most of the bands performing over the three-day lineup are of no interest to me whatsoever, with the exception of the following: TV On The Radio, Booker T, Clipse, Fucked Up, My Bloody Valentine (just for old time’s sake), and X (again, for old time’s sake). Six 30-minute sets over three days? Shit. Given the ticket price (see #3), the math just doesn’t work. Especially considering that most of the bands on the Coachella lineup that I would like to see will play in my area soon enough, at much smaller venues.
3. Ticket prices are outrageous. 3-Day passes: $269.00 + $3 charity + applicable service fees. Single Day Tickets: $99.00 + $1 charity + applicable service fees. Add those ticket prices to the costs of tansportation, lodging, and (way overpriced) food and water and booze and drugs, and that’s a lot of money to pay just to be uncomfortably close to legions of shirtless fratboy chads and screaming dingbat beckys.
4. More than a music fan, you are a target market. Consider this: There are two- and three-payment plans in a “layaway” option for ticket buyers who can’t pony up all the cash for entrance at once. If prospective concert goers can’t make all their payments, they forfeit their tickets and the money they spent up until the last payment. Naturally, there’s also plenty of crap merch to spend your hard-earned loot on, too, like T-Shirts, DVDs, posters, a handbag, and hoodies and scarves (because the Indio desert is a frigid fucking wasteland in late April). You don’t even have to go the show to give ‘em money and free marketing: Buy some swag online and make your friends think you’re hip from the comfort of your home. Nothing says “rock cred” like a T-shirt.
5. People like this: