Coachella 2024: Grimes issues apology following disastrous set

After a disastrous Coachella set impeded by technical issues, art pop icon Grimes has issued an apology, promising that her next performance will be “flawless.”

Grimes played on the second day of the festival alongside the likes of Blur, Ice Spice and headliner Tyler, The Creator. While the start of her set was promising, as she took to the stage seated on a spidery robot and mixed in tracks from Rihanna and Jennie.

Technical issues soon sent the set into disarray, with songs unexpectedly being played at the wrong speed. Grimes tried to restart tracks and fix the problems in real time on-stage, but eventually resorted to letting out her frustrations with screams. “All my tracks are twice as fast so I’m not mixing very well,” she explained.

Eventually, Grimes opted to cut her set short after playing a series of unreleased tracks and a short version of ‘Genesis’ from her 2012 album, Visions.

Now, the electro-pop artist has taken to X to explain and apologise to Coachella attendees . “I want to apologize for the technical issues with the show tonight,” she began a message posted on X.

Grimes went on to explain that while she usually handles “every aspect of the show,” she had “outsourced essential things like rekordbox bpms and letting someone else organize the tracks on the SD card” in the interest of time.

Ahead of her show at Coachella’s second weekend, she star stated that she will “personally organize all the files next week” and “will not let such a thing happen again.”

While audiences may have been disappointed by a short and stagnated set, it’s easy to see why Grimes opted to leave the stage early. Trying and failing to deal with technical issues in front of such a huge crowd is an intimidating task.

Crowd frustrations are to be expected, but some of the criticism directed at Grimes seems to have pushed into more personal territory. Hopefully, with more preparation and personal input, she can make good on her promise to deliver at her second set next weekend.

Read Grimes’ full apology below.

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