Coachella Day Three -- Rage Against the Machine

It finally came. I sat at the window this morning waiting for the sun to come up. A new dawn. A new day. And the day that Rage Against the Machine finally performs again!

Knowing Rage is one of my all time favorite bands, many of you will be shocked to learn I never got to see Rage perform live. The really crazy part is I was at Lollapalooza in 1992 and Rage played but I did not check them out. Sure I have the DVDs and such, but I've never been to a Rage concert before. For the Princess, she was introduced to Rage a little over five years ago by some guy she hooked up with. (OK, it was me!)

Anyway, because Rage broke up seven years ago, she really never had the chance to see them. I know the Princess pretty well and I bet if you would have asked her six months ago to tell you her top three wishes, a Rage Against the Machine Reunion would have been in that list (maybe even # 1). So, with that written, tonight is pretty damn important!

We arrived and got really great parking. Within 10 minutes, we were inside the Empire Polo Fields. I was sporting my brand new Mr. Bill t-shirt. (The kids didn't get it). After some photo opps, we waited a bit for Shawn, but we never found each other. So, we went to position ourselves for Rage.

We found a nice spot dead center, pretty far back but we wanted to enjoy the show and not have to worry about idiot skin heads ruining the show for us by involving us in unwanted moshing. (I hate those idiots). I mean, we are true fans after all but want to leave the show without being bruised up if at all possible. After finding the perfect position, we sat down on the ground and chatted a bit about how exciting it was going to be. I kept looking at my watch... time passing slowly... 20 minutes to go... 15 minutes to go... 10... 5... BAM!

Rage immediately jumped to life with Testify, rocking Indio like it has never been rocked before. I'm sure even the Polo horses that were left behind were jamming out! Princess' look on her face was that of pure satisfaction. She screamed and banged her head like the hard core rocker that she is. They went through one hit after another, each song getting better than the last. They fixed some sound issues and then things really started to take off.

I promised this blog will stay politically neutral so I can't get into how I feel about it, but Rage is a very political charged band. Zack did go into one verbal assault on the current US administration that was brutal enough to get some folks to push their way out and leave. All I have to say is: Screw those people. This is Rage Against the Machine. Let's ROCK!

After a brief break, Rage finished up their set with Killing in the Name Of.

Ahhhh... now we feel complete! 10 minute walk back to the car, followed by sitting there in traffic for over two hours until we actually moved! Bring on Rock the Bells!

Peace out... :)

JH

Photograph from M-TV.com