Table of Contents
Coachella, California………………….Pen Sunday 1st annual Coachella awards
Sunday Stories…………………WNBA, Animal Crossing, Coyotes, and more!
Sunday Songs……………………..See awards
Sunday Poll………………….A Coachella question
Last Thoughts …………………………Anthony Edwards is HIM
P.S ……………………………………….The Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival began in October 1999 as a two-day festival. Beck and Rage Against the Machine headlined, and more than 25,000 people attended, but the festival failed to make money.
Coachella, California
Happy Sunday everyone. This edition of Pen Sunday is a special one because at the time of writing this (11:00 Sunday morning), I am a few hours away from taking a shuttle to the third and final day of Coachella.
It’s my first time at the famed music festival, and it’s lived up to every expectation and blown past all the negative anti-hipster propaganda I’ve heard about it through the years. So far, it’s been great music, good food, good fits, and a hell of a way to spend a weekend.
The days at Coachella are fun, upbeat, and truly festival like. Artist stages are scattered around a field that can take 15-20 minutes to walk if you go from the very top of the map, the Coachella Stage, all the way down to the Sahara Stage, one of the newest stages the festival has added.
The sets themselves range in design and scale according to the artist they’re hosting, and seeing artist like Sublime, Tyler the Creator, and Sabrina Carpenter on the main stage makes you feel just how popular and famous they really are in comparison to artist who perform at smaller more intimate venues. Regardless of stage size however, each set comes with some of the most incredible, artistic, and captivating visuals I’ve seen during a concert. Each one is totally unique, tailored to the artist, and is so transcending in how you hear and interpret their music to the point that their individulality as an artist, shines. Each act at Coachella represents a niche or a type of person. And hearing the phrase, “voice of their generation” takes on a different meaning when you can see the slice of America, the world, or sound, that they take on and have made their own.
As an artist and creative, that was my primary take away. There are no copy cats. Be totally unique and original, and be really really really f****** good.
As a fan, I’ve listened to so much good music and seen so many artist I otherwise would never have had the chance to see, that I couldn’t think of any other way to honor them other than hosting an award show. So, without further ado, I’d like to present the 2024 Pen Sunday Coachella Awards (Through 2 Days)
Here are the categories:
Best Set
Best Visuals
Best Surprise Guest
Best Job
Best Fit
Best Crowd
Best Entrance
*Reminder that all awards are through Friday and Saturday acts only*
BEST SET
Best set is one of the most subjective awards on an already subjective list, but I’m defining best set as the set I was most captivated and impressed by from start to end. This includes visuals, music, performance, and atmosphere.
The Winner of the 2024 Pen Sunday Coachella Best Set Award is: Lil Uzi Vert
I had been sleeping on Uzi a lot more than I realized when he came out on stage and ripped through his first 3-4 songs. It was a moment that made me realize just how big Uzi was, what his music meant to kids in highschool (s/o class of 2016), and how many other bangers he had other than XO Tour Life.
For visuals, there was enough skull and death and punk rock imagery that if you transported Uzi’s entire set back in time and played it to a midevil European village, they’d fully convinced Uzi himself was either a devil, or a god.
I mean, imagine Just Wanna Rock dropping in 1650. Insane.
BEST VISUALS
Best Visuals is the award whose on screen imagery was the best, most interesting, creative, and attention-grabbing. For that, the award goes to no other than Ice Spice.
I loved a lot about Ice’s set. She actually rapped, danced (with a bit of twerking obviously), and overall just had great energy. Her visuals though, were on another level. A lot of New York, Grah, and pink/pretty “bad bitch” imagery. It was a ton of fun. And the girls loved it.
I was hoping she’d bring out PinkPantheress, who I’m on record of having a crush on, but alas, did not happen.
Honorary Mention: Faye Webster
BEST SURPISE GUEST
More than having a PinkPantheress crush, I am on serious record of being a Faye Webster fan. I’ve even been called a “stan” by some close to me. I can’t deny these allegations, so I won’t be making any comments at this time. But I will say that seeing Faye perform at the Mojave stage on Friday was one of my top 5 favorite music experiences in my life. The set was so soulful, mellow, and damn damn good. She also had great visuals, which include the washing, drying, and setting fire to a giant blue t-shirt, and a video-game-like sing along where it looked the audience became characters on a children’s show. It was great.
She was a close loss to Uzi, and a close loss to Ice in both of the categories so far, but once she brought out Lil Yachty….is there anything else I even need to say?
Faye?! Yachty?! It was like my spotify had come to life. So, Faye Webster wins this category for both bringing out Yachty, and for having a great f****** set.
BEST JOB
This category might seem out of place at first, but it takes A LOT of people to make Coachella happen. There are tons of funcitonal jobs that make the whole thing go round. From vendors, to production, lights, sound, design, art, security, every department has to be great at whatever it is they do to make sure the whole event goes smoothly and safely.
With that being said, the person/people I saw having the most fun during performances, aside from the artist themselves, are the on stage Sign Language Interpreters. I have no real idea how you’d apply this job, or what qualifies one SLI over another, but wow. They get their own mini stage to the left, but elevated to the same height as the stage, as well as their lighting set up so everyone in the crowd sho needs to, can see them. It’s great this exist, and it’s great we as audience members can see them because those people ARE HAVING A BLAST.
Imagine signing Lil Uzi? Or No Doubt? Or Ice Spice? What a fun gig. They probably make a good amount of money too, so shout out to them.
BEST FIT
Along with the music itself, one of the most defining cultural aspects of Coachella is the fit. I wouldn’t say people are going way out of their way to dress “hip” or trendy or cool, but there’s an undeniable aura in the air that this is both the time and place to get fits off. It makes it more fun, which makes the award fun.
I will split this award into two. One, for the best dressed artist, and two, the best civilian I saw. For the artist, they won this on Friday afternoon with their futursitic monochrome jumpsuits, L’Imperatrice. A band from Paris, France winning a fashion award feels elitist, but nonetheless. The fits were hard.
As for best civilian fit, I saw an older woman, maybe 70, who was in full modern-hippie flow, with neon dress, hair, pants, and rocking a pair of sweet multi-colored sneakers. I didn’t get a picture, but in hindsight maybe I should’ve. Shout out to her. The type of old woman we all want to be when we grow up.
BEST CROWD
This award, like others, are subject to change after I see all the Sunday performances, but for now this can’t go to anyone other than Ice Spice.
As I said earlier, the girls, (and some of the guys), LOVE Ice Spice. Her energy, attitude, the beats, everything about her set the audience loved. It was also one of the few sets where the audience would actively sing her lyrics either along with her, or back to her. And it was the only set where I saw people grinding on each other, a definite vibe change than anything I saw Friday or Saturday afternoon from the festival. So congrats Ice. Official 2 time Pen Sunday Coachella Awards award winner.
BEST ENTRANCE
Entrances are important. For me, I don’t like artist performing late, or walking on stage to say a few words before the set starts, or anything that keeps us mellow. As a fan, I want the anticipation, the extiment, for the realization to hit that holy s***, this is Lana Del Rey?!
I’m not Lana stan. I like Summertime Sadness, but past that I’ve never kept up with her music. However, on Friday as the Day 1 closing act, I watched Lana ride on the back of a motorcycle throught the Coachella fields, all the way to the main stage where she then started to perform and wow. WHAT AN ENTRANCE.
Congratulations Lana. No one else even came close.
That concluded the 2024 Pen Sunday Coachella Awards. Thank you to everyone who was nominated. And thank you all for reading! I have to leave now so this newsletter will miss it’s usual Sunday Songs section.
Sunday Stories
Israel-Palestine Human Rights Watch
USC valedictorian grad speech cancelled
What to know about abortion in Arizona under the near-total 1864 ban
Coyotes officially leaving Arizona for Salt Lake City
‘Rust’ Armorer Sentenced to 18 Months
Sunday Poll
Sunday Poll. Here’s the question of the week.
Voting is free and anonymous. All it takes is a subscription. (That’s free too).
You have one week to vote.
Results will be reviewed and discussed in next week’s edition.
Last Thoughts
Anthony Edwards!!!
PS
It’s the end of Pen Sunday, edition #77. If you reached the end, thank you for reading. It means a lot.
Pen Sunday is a newsletter about a writer, a dream, and a studio. With headlines from around the world, music, and maybe a poem. Every Sunday and Sunday only.
Until Sunday,
Solomon Lovejoy