Coachella has become the biggest festival in America — and it rewrote the live music playbook in the process. Katie Bain, Billboard‘s senior music correspondent and director of Billboard Dance, joins Billboard On The Record to break down how a scrappy desert show founded by then-local promoter Goldenvoice turned into a global cultural force, from the early Pearl Jam experiment to era-defining performances by Beyoncé, Daft Punk and Frank Ocean. She dives into the high-stakes gamble of booking a lineup, the business behind ticketing, sponsorships and livestreams, and how moments such as Radiohead’s 2006 set and Beyoncé’s Homecoming shifted the festival’s identity from alt-rock roots to global pop dominance. 

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To purchase a copy of Desert Dreams: The Music, Style and Allure of Coachella by Katie Bain, click here.

Billboard On The Record is a podcast in partnership with SickBird Productions. 

Host:  Kristin Robinson

Executive Producers:  Diona DaCosta, Jade Watson

Produced By: Kayla Forman, Mateo Vergara

Edited By: Rachel Derbyshire

Kristin Robinson: Coachella is back. The music festival returns to Indio, Calif., this weekend with headline performances from Justin Bieber, Sabrina Carpenter and Karol G. Coachella, however, is more than just a festival — it’s a bucket-list item for artists of all shapes and sizes, and performances are livestreamed to an audience of millions on YouTube around the world, making it one of the biggest and most impactful stages possible in music.

Today, I’m joined by my colleague, Katie Bain. She’s a senior correspondent, director of Billboard Dance and the author of Desert Dreams: The Music, Style, and Allure of Coachella, to talk through the history and business behind the big festival. Katie Bain, welcome to On the Record. 

Katie Bain: Thank you so much. Longtime fan, first time caller.

I’m so happy to have you here. I love it when I can have my coworkers on and talk about different topics that really pertain to their area of expertise. And so when I knew Coachella was coming up, I was like, ‘I have to have Katie,’ because, I mean, you have a book, it’s literally right there. 

Can you see it in the shot? 

Yeah. OK. So Desert Dreams came out, what, a few months ago?

It came out in October. 

October. 

Yeah.

Gosh. OK, time flies. 

It does. 

OK. So how did you end up getting involved with this book?

Yeah, so it kind of fell in my lap. The publisher got in touch with me through another podcast I was on, actually about Coachella a few years ago, and they were looking for someone to write a book about Coachella, and I became the guy.

Oh my gosh, I love that. I love that. So you’re gonna go back to the desert. You’re covering Coachella for us again. You’ve done this many times already, which is a very tough gig, by the way. People don’t know this, but it’s not an easy gig.

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