It is with regret that Cocteau Twins announce they will not be performing at the Coachella Valley Music Festival on April 30th as had been planned. Due to personal reasons, member Elizabeth Fraser has decided that she is unable to participate in the reunion, and apologies for any inconvenience that this has caused.
I had been wondering about this reunion. I always liked the Cocteau Twins, thought they were really beautiful to listen to... so dreamy! And sometimes scary. But always kind of a bedroom thing. At night. Or on rainy days. They were fun to sing along to because you could sing, or yodel, anything you wanted since Elizabeth Frasier never really sang anyway. In fact, I stopped enjoying them as much when she started singing words and stopped being another instrument contributing to the layers of sound. I saw them in 1988 and it was very nice, in a symphony hall on a college campus, very pretty.
I've been trying to figure out how they were going to do at this giant desert festival, filled with half naked and completely fucked up people, many of whom were infants when the Cocteau Twins were a defining force in 4AD's existence. Most people I know who are crazy into the Cocteau Twins are gay men, ethnic goths, and painfully intelligent girls. Will they be at the show? A skinny Asian guy shouting "Sugar Hiccup!"... A girl with cute glasses and a Buck Fush t-shirt calling for "Oomingmak!"... Or a nicely toned gay man in a white wifebeater yelling, "Frou Frou Foxes In Midsummer's Fires! FROU FROU FOXES IN MIDSUMMER'S FIRE! YEA!"
I appreciate the diversity of the Coachella lineup, and I know there were plenty of people excited about seeing the Cocteau Twins. But on a giant stage under the twilight palm trees... would their ethereal presence just waft into the air? Guess we'll never know.
