Music festivals are king in 2019. But it wasn't always that way.
When Coachella Valley Music And Arts Festival debuted in 1999, just months after the disastrous Woodstock '99, the reviews were good but the ticket sales were not. Through determination, imagination, curation, and hard work, Coachella survived and thrived, celebrating its 20th anniversary this year, with last year's #Beychella as empirical evidence of its cutting-edge, culture-creating platform power. Even Goldenvoice president and Coachella co-founder Paul Tollett couldn't see his brainchild turning into the mega-event it's become two decades later.
Paul Tollett at site of Coachella in 2004
Photo: Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times/Getty Images
"The hope was that it would be annual," Tollett told the Los Angeles Times in a rare and extensive interview. We never thought about two weekends. Never thought about a country version. Never thought about a Desert Trip. Those are all things that happened along the way."
But expansion to musical and cultural ubiquity hasn't come without its challenges. Tollett admits he "lost a lot of money in 2008," due to the last-minute addition of Prince to the bill and Stagecoach, Goldenvoice's country festival held at the same site in Indio, Calif. And despite the deafening buzz of Beyonce's headlining performance last year, Teen Vogue reported rampant sexual harassment at the festival, with all 54 of the young women they interviewed at the festival describing sexual assault or harassment they experienced. Tollett addressed the issue directly and firmly in the interview.
"It spurred a lot of discussion internally, said Tollett. "We have security, of course, and all the normal things that you have at public assemblage events. But in addition to that, we want to have something specific to this. Lots of things can go wrong where crowds are. This is one more thing coming to light now more than ever, since the #MeToo era."
Tollett and his team took action, creating the brand-new Every One program to fight assault and harassment.
"We are committed to messaging, on-site support, trainings, and increased visibility and awareness for the campaign," Tollett said. "We’re challenging staff and attendees to be an integral part of this culture shift. Through these steps, we believe that we can co-create a festival culture that encourages active consent, inclusivity and community responsibility."
The new initiative was announced the same day, Jan. 3, as the lineup for 2019, let by headliners Childish Gambino, Tame Impala and Ariana Grande, and an extended live-stream partnership with YouTube. Not long before the announcement, Kanye West very publically bowed out of what would have been his third appearance at Coachella.
"When we were going through the stage ideas, he had some other ideas. He's played Coachella, and he knows it very well. Both times were great, and so different. The last one was pure art. He has some great [production] ideas, but we just weren't able to pull them off right now," said Tollett. "Up until Jan. 1, we were making a poster with Kanye on it. We started realizing we're probably going to have an impasse production-wise."
Coachella 2019 will take place over two weekend, April 12–14 and 19–21. Tickets are sold out, but passes may become available. You can sign up for the waitlist via the festival website.
