\n<\/p>\n
The first weekend of Coachella 2026<\/a> is over. It was quite the three days out in the desert, too. Pop stars made head-turning creative choices, rock favorites brought boundless energy, and icons continued to innovate. Consequently, there were so many great sets and individual moments worth looking back on. The weather offered some scares<\/a>, but ultimately, the festival will be remembered by the highlights. So far, after just one weekend, Coachella has proven there\u2019s so much to love about the never-boring contemporary music landscape.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Turnstile\u2019s big moment came at a sensitive time for the band: Earlier this month, Brady Ebert, the band\u2019s former guitarist, was arrested<\/a> on charges of attempted second-degree murder and first-degree assault of Bill Yates, the father of lead singer Brendan Yates. At the start of their set, the band played a set of pre-recorded videos, one of which was from the elder Yates, which got some big cheers from the audience. Once the show got going, it boasted the classic Turnstile intensity, complete with a mosh pit, Brendan crowd-surfing, and favorites like \u201cNever Enough\u201d and \u201cBlackout.\u201d<\/p>\n After a long day trudging across festival grounds in the hot sun, it\u2019s a big ask to show up to a late-night set. It\u2019s not nearly as bad, though, when you\u2019re staying up for Not For Radio, the solo project of The Mar\u00edas\u2019 Mar\u00eda Zardoya. She went on at around midnight on Friday, but her gorgeous sleepy-hours performance was worth pushing the limits of fatigue. Aside from Zardoya just being generally fantastic, fans were treated to the live debut of an unreleased song. It was all part of a stunning new performance that Zardoya called \u201cFireflies After Dark<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n A few days before Coachella began, Carpenter stirred up some excitement when she said<\/a> of her planned performance, \u201cIt\u2019s the most ambitious show I\u2019ve ever done,\u201d revealing that she had seven months to work on it. As expected, it was a spectacle. There were appearances from Sam Elliott, Susan Sarandon, Will Ferrell, and Samuel L. Jackson. Jackson helped Carpenter have one of her most memorable \u201cJuno\u201d positions: Instead of pulling a suggestive pose, a Jackson voiceover played, in which he took the audience on a brief meditation before calmly telling Carpenter to \u201cfinish the motherf*ckin\u2019 song.\u201d The whole thing was showmanship at its finest.<\/p>\n Geese have been crushing it with live covers lately, nailing New Radicals\u2019 \u201cYou Get What You Give\u201d in the BBC Radio 1 Live Lounge a few months ago<\/a>. They were at it again at Coachella this past weekend, though they went with a more contemporary cut: While performing their own \u201c2122,\u201d they threw in a snippet of Justin Bieber\u2019s \u201cBaby,\u201d presumably as a nod to Bieber headlining the fest. Did anybody see this coming? No, but was it awesome? It was Geese, so yes, absolutely. The Geese hype was real, even luring Carpenter to check out the set from the audience.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Nine Inch Nails have welcomed a new collaborator into their creative universe: Boys Noize, who remixed Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross Challengers<\/em> soundtrack, worked on to NIN\u2019s Tron: Ares soundtrack<\/em>, and was an opener on their Peel It Back Tour<\/em>. Now he\u2019s part of the crew, as he joined Reznor and Ross in a new supergroup, Nine Inch Noize<\/a>. They made their big debut at Coachella. It wasn\u2019t completely clear what they would end up doing together, although the most expected possibility turned out to be it: On the aforementioned tour, Boys Noize remixed a bunch of NIN songs, and their fantastic joint set this past weekend was full of masterful re-workings.<\/p>\n PinkPantheress went heavy on the collaborators, too: The Dare got his own three-song section of her set, playing new Addison Rae and Charli XCX remixes, along with his own \u201cGirls.\u201d When the spotlight returned to PinkPantheress, she shared it with Thundercat, who brought his otherworldly bass dexterity as Pink sang \u201cBreak It Off.\u201d PinkPantheress nailed it overall, continuing to shine when she didn\u2019t have performance partners to give her a boost. She\u2019s come a long way from the production-minded artist whose view of performing live was fueled by fear<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Bieber was perhaps the biggest star in the desert last weekend, but his set was one of the most divisive<\/a>. For the back half of it, he had a laptop hooked up to a giant screen behind him, playing his own old videos as he sang along to his back catalog. At one point, he even went ahead and just watched the \u201cdeez nuts\u201d meme<\/a>. Some called it lazy, but one thing nobody could rightfully label it was forgettable. Having a YouTube watch party on stage at the biggest festival in the world is a big swing, but it\u2019s one that paid off as the headlining set turned into a fun, casual, nostalgia-fueled hang. As Zara Larsson put it, \u201cIt\u2019s giving let\u2019s smoke and watch YouTube<\/a>,\u201d but that wasn\u2019t a bad thing.<\/p>\n Sombr is more of a rock fan that some people might realize. He\u2019s big on classic UK bands<\/a>, he played a great cover of The Cranberries\u2019 \u201cLinger\u201d<\/a> last month, and he led with rock once again at Coachella. His performance was highlighted by bringing Billy Corgan on stage for \u201c1979.\u201d Sombr played his part perfectly, too, letting Corgan belt out the iconic first line of the chorus, \u201cAnd I don\u2019t even care, to shake these zipper blues,\u201d as only he can with his distinct voice. Sombr\u2019s a wonderful performer, but it was endearing to see him just be a fan, too.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Wet Leg already have plenty of social currency among rock icons, like Dave Grohl, who joined them on stage at Coachella back in 2023<\/a>. Their profile has only increased since then, and they\u2019ve only gotten better. Their late-afternoon set was full of energy and charm, and even a surprise appearance from Horsegiirl. For attendees who missed them this time, they shouldn\u2019t repeat the mistake this coming weekend.<\/p>\n More than most of her contemporaries, Twigs is a charismatic and high-effort performer. Remember when she got really good at pole dancing just for one video<\/a>? She never phones it in, both with the music and her choreography, which would be impressive even if she wasn\u2019t also singing through it. She brought back her pole-dancing prowess for a particularly moving rendition of \u201cCellophane,\u201d and it was a striking way to put a bow on Weekend 1.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\nTurnstile<\/h2>\n
Not For Radio<\/h2>\n
Sabrina Carpenter<\/h2>\n
Geese<\/h2>\n
Nine Inch Noize<\/h2>\n
PinkPantheress<\/h2>\n
Justin Bieber<\/h2>\n
Sombr<\/h2>\n
Wet Leg<\/h2>\n
FKA Twigs<\/h2>\n