Festival attendees looking to dance away their Friday night had a few viable options during the nine o’clock hour at the 2010 edition of Coachella. The overwhelming majority opted for the main stage debut of LCD Soundsystem, while residents of the Sahara tent stayed at home for the electro beats of Erol Alkan. A couple thousand people wanted something different and unique, and they found it in the Gobi tent with Little Dragon.
Hailing from Gothenburg, Sweden, Little Dragon is an electronic pop group that further raises an already highly elevated bar on the quality and uniqueness of Swedish pop music. Musically, Little Dragon is a cross between 90’s trip-hop and 80’s synth pop, while Yukimi Nagano’s vocals are reminiscent of an old school soul singer channeling Björk. The end result is a sound that is distinctly Little Dragon.
At Coachella, Little Dragon’s set peaks with an extended performance of “Feather”, a single from their 2009 album Machine Dreams. Wearing a glow-in-the-dark Snow White-esque dress, Nagano is full of energy and seems especially excited to be performing at Coachella. Nagano complements her soulful vocals with her own brand of dancing, as she sensually moves to the beat in the bass-driven “Feather”. It’s on the live stage that the already intriguing music of Little Dragon becomes something irresistibly compelling.
