“This is the oldest I ever felt at Coachella… It’s just too much.” Says Diplo, the solo artist, DJ and songwriter, who has worked with stars such as Beyoncé, Madonna, Britney Spears and Justin Bieber.

When asked about his opinion on this year’s Coachella lineup, “I think they honestly might be having a hard time booking headliners,” is what he said. “There’s not much left. We kind of left the era of great superhero acts, like the Red Hot Chili Peppers or Daft Punk.”

According to him, while recent headline acts such as Bad Bunny and BLACKPINK are “cool,” they are merely “just the most Top 40 there is…like they’re stadium acts,” and pale in comparison to the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Daft Punk in previous years.

Despite his disappointment for Coachella, Diplo points out that the reason behind the struggle for organizers to find acts worthy of their headline slot is the lack of “really culturally relevant new acts” available to pick from. While Diplo called Labyrinth “part of the zeitgeist” to represent the “real Coachella,” he felt that the organizers “had to scramble to find things that were cultural touchstones, but also could bring a big crowd in,” and that resulted in an underwhelmed lineup for him.

Diplo also admitted his disappointment with Frank Ocean, who was featured on this year’s headline but was replaced due to an injury, saying that “He doesn’t really care about his fans, to give them a concert.” He added on that “It was a show where the ice rink didn’t work and that’s all it needs to be… he just doesn’t really care about shows. I think that’s Coachella’s fault.”

Photo Credit: Mehreen Rizvi