Some sort of Vacation Recap/Review

Where to start? There is over a weeks worth of stuff to mention here. Coachella and Joshua Tree, a day driving around Phoenix checking out housing prices and suburbs and the Diamondbacks vs. Cubs game that we took in on Wednesday evening.

As an East Coaster I will sum Coachella up like this... Yawn. I guess I am just getting old, but I knew that for quite some time. I guess alot of it has a bit to do with my general distaste for any sort of guitar rock or almost any type of non electro or electronic music in general. All those parties oh so many years ago must of warped and distorted my brain subliminally to only be attracted to a some squelchy and synthisized tones along with a funky house beat.

It was a shame that both Crystal and I were tired each night. But the short sleep on Thursday night coupled with a 4 hour plane ride followed by a 4 hour ride to Indio and the three hour time change sure did bring the pain to our mental health.

At the airport we did get the best service from Enterprise Rent a Car. We were just going with the cheapy Chevy Aveo since the car was pretty much going to just be parked at Coachella and then Joshua Tree we really didn't feel the need to splurge on the car. Well Enterprise was out of Aveo's when we got to the airport and the wanted to upgrade us to a Jeep Grand Cherokee at no charge, but the gas on that would have been way more than we wanted to deal with so we asked what else they could do for us and we ended up with a brand new Dodge Stratus with only 8,000 miles on it. Sweet. So everything was off to a great start. We did notice the following day that the Stratus had a 90 day temporary plate on it and the plate expired on 4/29, so we had the car for 5 days with an expired plate, but we were never pulled over, so no harm no foul I guess.

We overshot Indio on the way there in our quest to find a WalMart or Target as we still needed a few odds and ends for Coachella as well as a few things for Joshua Tree. We were pretty much sucessful at the Wal Mart Super Center in Palm Springs. Lucky that you guys can get alcohol at WalMart and Target in Cali, nothing like that here in New England. We made it to the Polo Grounds while it was still light out on Friday evening. Check in and the line to have your stuff searched went reasonably well. The search was pretty minor and not all that invasive and the line moved pretty well. We were then wristbanded and off to find our little plot of land that was F32. It was our first time setting up the Eureka tent and we were able to pull it off in about half an hour or so. There was a bit of cursing back and forth but we were able to pull together as a team and make it happen! Friday night consisted of Crystal and I drinking a bottle of vodka mixed with some warm Sprite Zero, checking out the Dodge Tent and the karaoke goings on. A drunken bedtime was had around 1am and the sun had us wide awake in a steamy tent by 6am.
The showers in the campground were well maintained and worked well, each morning the shower made me feel a million times more human than I did a few moments before. Saturdays highlights included Perry Farrell with Hybrid more for the energy that Perry's presence brought to the room as opposed to any other reason as the mix and levels coming from his mic seemed to be shit. Lady Sovereign had a ball in the Gobi Tent and really seemed to be having a good time. Other than that we were treated to a Derrick Carter and Carl Cox tag team, they took turns throwing down slabs of wax opposite one another and I had a chance to cut a rug on a nice patch of grass. Other than that I caught a bit of Lyrics Born in the tent and listened to the rest of his set in a shade area, the same can be said for Clap Your Hands and Say Yeah and Franz Ferinand. Kanye did bring his A game to the main stage on Saturday even if there was some craziness surrounding his set time and playlist. Ms. C and I were tired as all hell and headed back to camp a few tracks into the Depeche Mode set.

The campground was pretty quiet upon our return and we were asleep within seconds. Again up with the sweltering heat by 6am and off to the showers. We went into town for breakfast and then hit up Target for a taste of civilization. I'll tell you a Target bathroom has never looked so good as that one in Palm Desert did. We were back in the Coachella camping parking lot by 9:30 or so and just hung out in the car air conditioning for an hour or so as it was better than the alternative of hanging out in the sweltering heat. Crystal had the brilliant idea of making it priority number one to buy on of those squeeze bottle mister fans right off the bat on Sunday. That little contraption seemed to be able to lower the body temp in amajor way and made the high 90 temps so much more bearable. Crystal spent most of her day giving every bit of exposed skin a good spritz with that bottle of hers. The highlight of Sunday was the great set put forth by Gnarls Barkley as the sun was starting to go down along with a great early afternoon slot filled by Murs that included a great bit of him lip synching to Coldplay. The half of Amadow & Miriam was great too. World beat nouveau funk for the soul. Ted Leo was a big disappointment. Blah! Got to meet the one and the only Tony Pierce of busblog fame, and talked about Fantasy Baseball and such for a few minutes before carrying on with the day. Tony rules, Coachella as a whole would have been a major letdown if I wasn't able to bump into the man and the myth for a few minutes. Stayed so far away from Madonna and listened to Mogwai while laying on the grass. The bit of Matisyahu we saw was decent. Massive Attack started out way to mellow for my liking. Crystal totaly wanted to just chill at Massive Attack but I wanted to catch as much of Mylo's dj set as possible. He is a great remixing and producing talent (check his Mylo vs. Miami Sound Machine Drop The Pressure bit) and I wanted to see what he had going for him as a dj. We made our way to the post Sahara dj tent to find a trainwrecking Mylo who was spinning some decent thumping house but in no way keeping any decent continuity or flow with his set. I wanted to catch some of Gilles Peterson, Jazzanova and or The Sissor Sisters to round out the festival but again we headed back to the campground and found immediate slumber. We were of to Joshua Tree in the morning and needed our sleep.

So that was Coachella...... Info on Joshua Tree/ Desert Buzz and Phoenix to follow.