10 Best US Music Festivals of 2013

Coachella

Early/Mid April

It would be impossible for us to ignore the cultural impact Coachella has had across virtually every major US music festival. The sweaty festival held every year just within the Indio valley has served as somewhat of a ‘gateway festival’ for thousands, bringing casual fans into the experience by the thousands.

We could easily spout off a hundred things that made Coachella so memorable year to year — the Daft Punk pyramid, the Tupac hologram, Kanye West descending from a crane, way too much Heineken and maybe one day, pretty please, an LCD Soundsystem reunion. Coachella has set the trend for many other US music festivals since its inception.

With a long running music festival comes a lot of change. Die hard Coachella fans tooks major exception to the festival spanning two weekends for starters. We admit, the crowd has gotten a lot more … diverse … shall we say? Lindsay Lohan sightings are totally common these days but the train of fraternity brothers whipping their shirts around near the Oasis are relatively new commodities.

One thing we’ll always appreciate about Coachella is their ability to cater to a wide range of music tastes. You just can’t understate the value of walking from a St. Vincent show to Dog Blood set in under a minute.

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