The Coachella lineup is here and with it, the unofficial start of another music festival season. The flower crowns and overpriced Heineken may still be months away—this year’s Coachella takes place from April 12-14 and April 19-21 at its traditional home in Indio, California—but each year the shrinking Willy Wonka font sizes of the Coachella lineup poster offer a bracing visual metaphor for the musical zeitgeist. In 2019, the biggest boldface names belong to Childish Gambino, Tame Impala, and Ariana Grande, but as always, what’s going on in smaller typeface is no less intriguing: from Solange, likely with new music, to Pusha T, Aphex Twin, Janelle Monáe, Kacey Musgraves, on down to Ty Segall & White Fence and Tierra Whack. Here are six big-picture takeaways from the lineup announcement. —Marc Hogan
Although Coachella’s lineup leaks have held true before, the speculation that Kanye West, Justin Timberlake, and Childish Gambino would take 2019’s top spots turned out to be only one-third correct. Given the rocky years for Kanye and JT, the accurate part was Mr. Donald Glover, whose musical endeavors have blossomed from clumsy raps to full-throated funk and audacious truth-telling.
With Ariana Grande, on a triumphant run following Sweetener and “thank u, next,” the festival extends its pop-friendly turn in the headliner department while still retaining a slight cachet. For those who thought her recent tour announcement meant she couldn’t possibly do Coachella, well, she left a couple of dates conspicuously open—she’s just going to be living on a plane for much of April.
Tame Impala’s presence might raise a few eyebrows in a “who is Bonny Bear” type of way—are they really that big? But they are qualified, with fest-headliner experience and usually some kind of laser/light show that should work well on a big stage in the desert, amid mass toking. Also, maybe Coachella’s organizers know something about the Aussie psych explorers’ next album that the general public doesn’t yet. —MH
The EDM bubble was supposed to have burst, but apparently Coachella-goers will still be waiting for the beat to drop. While last year’s lineup seemed to herald a shift away from the rave-tent brostep of yore, toward mellower styles that have caught on in the streaming era, this year’s poster devotes precious second-line space to blunt-force party starters. It’s not just pop-adjacent hitmakers like Zedd or DJ Snake, but also freaking Bassnectar, who made more sense during corporate dance music’s gold-rush years. Excuse us nerds, we’ll just be in the corner salivating over Aphex Twin. —MH
As urbano and K-pop continue to make big waves in the American mainstream, it’s no surprise that Coachella is enlisting more international stars. The enormously popular BLACKPINK will be the first K-Pop girl group to perform at Coachella. (Back in 2016, Epik High became the first male K-pop group to play the fest.) They’re also not the only South Korean act to grace the lineup: Hyukoh will play on Sunday, proving the growing profile of the country’s indie rock scene.
Latin trap’s reigning goofball Bad Bunny, reggaetón giant J Balvin, and Flamenco-pop provocateur Rosalía score prominent spots, but when it comes to Spanish-language music, Coachella didn’t just focus on the biggest chart-toppers and rising stars. Long-running Mexican norteño band Los Tucanes de Tijuana land in the second row of the lineup poster, while established Chilean singer-songwriter Mon Laferte is billed in the third. Seems like Coachella was trying to avoid last year’s X Japan fiasco, wherein they shaded the hugely successful Japanese glam-rockers by delegating them all the way to the fifth line. They couldn’t avoid stepping on someone’s toes, though: Nigerian Afrobeat star Burna Boy, who sings in both English and Yoruba, called out Coachella for giving him third-line placement. “I am an AFRICAN GIANT and will not be reduced to whatever that tiny writing means,” he wrote on his Instagram story, “Fix tings quickly please.” —Michelle Kim
In addition to solid headliners and some second-tier goodies, if you squint hard enough you might come away feeling like the Coachella lineup is actually pretty good this year. In minor crimes against humanity, U.S. Girls, Iceage, Hop Along, Hurray for the Riff Raff, and Let’s Eat Grandma are tucked away in the bottom two rows of their respective days. In slightly more legible typefaces we find Lizzo, Tierra Whack, Soccer Mommy, Rico Nasty, Clairo, JPEGMAFIA, and more rising Pitchfork favorites. And it’s amazing to imagine the typically faded Coachella-goer stumbling upon a performance from beautiful weirdos like serpentwithfeet and Yves Tumor. —MK
Though some well-deserving artists got borderline offensive lineup placements, none of it can top the fact that Coachella may have legitimately mis-billed Gucci Mane as “Gucci Gang.” There’s a slight chance this could be Lil Pump and an entourage performing his hit song of the same name, but Coachella certainly implicates itself by featuring a picture and social links for Gucci Mane on its website. So far, neither the festival nor the Atlanta rap mainstay has responded to Pitchfork’s requests for clarification. UPDATE (3:25 p.m. EST): Coachella has changed its site to clarify what Gucci Gang is: a collaboration of Mane, Pump, and Smokepurpp. —MK
Those who are surprised to see Idris Elba lurking in the fourth row of Saturday’s lineup might not know that the actor is a house DJ and a singer/rapper who records under the name Driis. Perhaps not so coincidentally, Elba also plays a DJ in an upcoming Netflix show, “Turn Up Charlie,” which premieres about a month before Coachella. His titular character is described as an “eternal bachelor” who becomes a nanny because his music career isn’t quite working out. And speaking of hard pivots, Louis Vuitton and Off-White boss Virgil Abloh will continue to try to get his music career to pop off with a DJ set on Saturday. —MK
Follow along with our full coverage of Coachella 2019.
