Image via flickr / Jason Persse
This weekend marks the start of 14th installment of The Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in Indio California, but as far as I’m concerned, it may as well be called Indio Fashion Week 2013. Everywhere I turn I see another how-to guide about the “right” music festival outfit. Free People, the store long established as a go-to for festival fashion coverage has even posted an inspiration entry on their blog for how to create the “perfect” festival campsite, dyed native-inspired feathers, bouquets of dried flowers, and tambourines included (they “make the perfect festival accessory,” didn’t you know?)
Every year as Coachella approaches, kicking off the season of summer music festivals, I feel like I see less and less coverage about the music and more about the fashion. Don’t get me wrong, I like fashion, but the yearly parade of slight variations on cut-offs, leather fringed crop tops and floral dresses don’t say much for creativity or innovation, and they certainly don’t represent the same counterculture political messages they did in the 60s, at music festivals like Woodstock.
But fashion companies know a good marketing opportunity when they see it, and the celebrity-ridden Southern California show has quickly become product placement mecca. Companies like H&M, Guess, Mulberry, and Lacoste (the list goes on) sponsor performances, lounges, parties, and gifting suites. They even produce festival collections. “Festivals now come with their own style and you can’t go to one not looking the part,” one well-gifted blogger pointed out in her post about Guess’ “Summer Revival Music Festival Collection.”
A screen grab of a selection of menswear form the Guess Summer Revival Music Festival Collection
The pressure to fit into the very prescribed image associated with these festivals has even spawned forums for “Fitchella” diets on Reddit and on the festival’s own website, where both men and women track their pre-festival weight-loss. “It’s easier to stand the heat when you’re skinn[i]er…” says one post. It’s also easier to slip into the clothes and the mold one seems to have to fit in order to feel welcome at these events.
I’ve never been to Coachella, but I have been to another California summer festival, Outside Lands, in San Francisco. I went to Outside Lands with my mom, who lives in California and generously bought the tickets for us to go together. I was slightly embarrassed to be attending one of these events, which are geared at a younger audience, with mom, so I put some extra effort into at least looking the part. Jeans and a Bridget Bardot-printed tank with an old worn down flannel and a motorcycle jacket. But as usually happens when you try too hard with fashion, you fail. I froze my ass off failing to factor in the very cold San Francisco summer evenings. Looking around at all the (warm) casual layering of true laid back Northern California girls, I didn’t feel comfortable in my own skin. I felt out of place and distracted from enjoying some of my favourite bands.
In high school, when I first started going to concerts, I wore converse to avoid foot stomping in the mosh pit and dark shirts to hide the sweat rubbed off on me by burly, over-zealous fans. I dressed for utility and for looks, and I always walked out of a concert feeling like I’d gotten the full experience.
Today these festivals seem to be all about staged celebrity fashion photo-ops that completely overshadow the music itself. Sometimes it feels like no one even bothers to review the bands anymore. Cliché festival fashion poster girl Vanessa Hudgens’ Instagram certainly doesn’t betray any excitement about the music, sharing what clothes she’s planning to wear rather than what bands she’s excited to see.
Vanessa Hudgens (top) and Kate Boswoth at Coachella 2012 . Images via jadore-fashion.com
Meanwhile, other celebrities like Kate Bosworth and Diane Kruger are held up as examples and inspiration for those less adept at pulling off the festival look. For those of us with average bodies and budgets, these celebrities’ Coachella experiences are held up as something to strive for and it’s not surprising that we’re let down when our own experiences don’t live up to what we were lead to expect.
This year I’m heading to yet another California music festival, the inaugural BottleRock in Napa. Without a doubt, the increased commercialization of music festivals is why this new one even exists. It seems to me that all of these festivals, including Canadian ones like Osheaga, are destined to go the way of Coachella– the branding, the celebrities, and the image becoming far louder than the sounds.
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Eva Voinigescu is an intern at Toronto Standard. Follow her on Twitter @EvaVoinigescu.
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