If there was ever a time in the last half-century that’s come close to mirroring the social upheaval of the 1960s, it’s now.
Think of the protests over institutional racism brought on by police shootings, the feminist issues revived on a national scale by sexual assault allegations against Donald Trump, the decade-plus conflicts overseas that have already taken thousands of American lives.
But Friday night at Desert Trip, the second round of a two-weekend music festival in Indio starring the most influential artists of ’60s counterculture, there was little if any of that urgency in performances by the Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan.
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Instead they stayed safely rooted in nostalgia, delivering well-executed sets while doing exactly what they railed against in their youth: fostering complacency by sticking to a well-worn script.
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Roger Waters performs Oct. 16 during the second weekend of Desert Trip in Indio, Calif.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Roger Waters and his band perform Oct. 16 during the second weekend of Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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An elaborate stage set-up surrounds Roger Waters as he performs Oct. 16 druing the second weekend of Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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A fan records part of Roger Waters’ Oct. 16 set during the second weekend of Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Roger Waters performs Oct. 16 in front of a giant screen at Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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From a distance, fans watch and record Roger Waters’ Oct. 16 Desert Trip performance.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Roger Waters’ Oct 16 performance closes out the second weekend of the Desert Trip festival in Indio, Calif.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend of The Who open with their early hit, “I Can’t Explain,” during the second weekend of Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Roger Daltrey swings the microphone in his trademark style as The Who performs during the second weekend of Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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A water vendor at weekend 2 of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Drummer Zak Starkey performs with The Who.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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A music fan seeks shade from the sun as it sets during the second weekend of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Pete Townshend strums his guitar in his trademark windmill style as The Who performs.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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A fan attends the second weekend of Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend of The Who.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Music fans take pictures at a large reproduction of the album cover for the Wings’ 1973 release of “Band On The Run.”
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Fans show their appreciation for the legeendary rock band The Who during the second weekend of Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Paul McCartney takes the stage during Weekend 2 of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Anticipation builds for Paul McCartney’s performance at weekend 2 of Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Paul McCartney performs during Weekend 2 of Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Paul McCartney performs during Weekend 2 of Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Paul McCartney performs during weekend 2 of Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Paul McCartney performs during weekend 2 of Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Neil Young banters with the crowd during a performance at Weekend 2 of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Neil Young performs at weekend 2 of Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Camera and lighting personnel wait for Neil Young’s show to begin during Weekend 2 of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Neil Young performs at Weekend 2 of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Neil Young performs with his band at Weekend 2 of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Neil Young performs at Weekend 2 of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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The setting sun casts a golden glow as a couple poses for a picture in front of a large reproduction of the album cover for “Band on the Run” by Paul McCartney and Wings during Weekend 2 of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Concertgoers cast shadows on umbrellas spread out on the Empire Polo Grounds for Weekend 2 of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Music fans wait in line to check out the vinyl and cassette tapes at a record store on the Empire Polo Grounds during Weekend 2 of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Music fans thumb through the selection of vinyl at a record store on the Empire Polo Grounds during Weekend 2 of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Terayuki Kobayashi, 25, a visitor from Japan, checks out an image of Mick Jagger at a photo exhibit during Weekend 2 of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones perform on the second weekend of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones perform on the second weekend of Desert Trip in Indio.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones perform at Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones perform at Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones perform at Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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The Rolling Stones perform at Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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The Rolling Stones perform at Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Fans enjoy the Rolling Stones at Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Mick Jagger sings at Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Mick Jagger performs at Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Concert-goers wander the Empire Polo Grounds in Indio as gates open for Desert Trip’s second weekend.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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The sun beats down on huge crowds waiting to buy merchandise at Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Fans pose for pictures in front of large reproductions of classic album covers at Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Hungry fans crowd a pizza vendor at Desert Trip.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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The sun sets as a crowd gathers at the Empire Polo Grounds to watch Bob Dylan’s performance on Desert Trip’s second weekend.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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The sun sets as a crowd gathers for Bob Dylan’s performance.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Bob Dylan is projected on a big screen as he opens Desert Trip’s second weekend.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Shafts of light from the setting sun stream through the dust.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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The moon looms over the stage as fans wait for Bob Dylan to perform.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Fans pose for photos under a large reproduction of the Rolling Stones’ “Some Girls” album.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
Dressed in a bright red and electric blue shirt, Mick Jagger strutted across the stage, clapping and jumping frenetically as he and the rest of the Stones turned the foreboding “Paint It Black” into an almost cheery number.
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And Dylan, who’d just won the Nobel Prize for literature a day earlier, moved silently between originals such as “Tangled Up in Blue” and a cover of a tune made famous by Frank Sinatra, delivering a smooth, steady, ire-free set.
They gave the crowd what they wanted, it seemed. Fans who made the trek to the desert venue (which is also home to the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival) and paid $699 for seating or $199 to sit on the grass appeared content just to witness all of their musical heroes in one place — one-stop shopping for the Woodstock generation. The rest of the weekend’s line up includes Paul McCartney, Neil Young, Roger Waters and The Who.
“God, he’s 75 and he still sounds this good?!” yelled one silver-haired attendee to his friend as Jagger, 73, performed “Tumbling Dice.”
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The grounds were as comfortable as the artist’s sets. Those who could afford it payed $179 for a “culinary experience” that offered food by name chefs; others sipped $13 cups of pilsner in the beer gardens or shopped at merchandise booths that included $70 Macca hoodies and $25 Desert Trip canvas shopping totes.
Fans pose with oversized album covers on the festival grounds.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times )
The world outside was just that — outside.
Escapism and immediate gratification, of course, are core components in pop and rock music, and that was true in the 1960s as well. But what made the acts on Desert Trip the legends they are today was an iconoclastic approach that wasn’t simply about a generational divide; their music captured the fears, hopes and confusion of a culture on the precipice of change.
We’re there again today, and the music they made back then — “Street Fighting Man,” “The Times They Are a-Changin’” — couldn’t be more relevant.
But rather than make that connection Friday with comments from the stage or a revived urgency in their music that one could just feel (no new lyrics required), it was about enjoying the familiar — much of it in songs whose meanings have become watered down by radio repetition or buried in historical reverence.
If the first weekend of the festival was any indication, the repeating roster of rock greats this weekend will leave all the political stuff up to Waters, who plays Sunday.
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On Friday, Jagger instead chose to riff on the fact that the average age of the headliners at the fest is 72, thus the nickname Oldchella. It’s the “Catch ’Em Before They Croak” tour, he said. Funny — and sad — for fans and the bands they love.
The world is still theirs to fight for, and their music still has a place in that fight. But only if they’re willing to sacrifice nostalgic comforts for a bit of modern-day tumult.
Lorraine Ali is news and culture critic of the Los Angeles Times. Previously, she was television critic for The Times covering media, breaking news and the onslaught of content across streaming, cable and network TV. Ali is an award-winning journalist and Los Angeles native who has written in publications ranging from the New York Times to Rolling Stone and GQ. She was formerly senior writer for The Times’ Calendar section where she covered entertainment, culture, and American Arab and Muslim issues. Ali started at The Times in 2011 as music editor after leaving her post as a senior writer and music critic at Newsweek Magazine.
