This weekend in the desert marks the unofficial start of music festival season.
Music fans are flocking to California's Coachella Valley for the main arts festival, which kicks off today and features headliners like Lady Gaga, Green Day and Post Malone.
Opening day promises to be hot, literally; a dome of high pressure is causing a small heatwave in Southern California, with meteorologists predicting temperatures could exceed 37.8°C.
Organisers are urging the tens of thousands of people expected to arrive at the lightly shaded festival grounds to stay hydrated and use sunscreen as they gather to see other highlights on the first day's programme, including rapper Missy Elliott, Australian electropop band Parcels and a rare appearance in the States by British punk ravers The Prodigy.
This weekend in the desert marks the unofficial start of the music festival season, which Lady Gaga is preparing to kick off with a bang. Ahead of the release of her latest album Mayhem, the pop star has promised "a huge night of mayhem".
"I can't wait to hear you all singing and dancing until you faint," she wrote when announcing the line-up, as quoted by AFP.
South African star Taila is also scheduled to perform, a year after an injury forced her to pull out of the 2024 festival.
"I had many opportunities to go but I swore to myself the first time I went to Coachella I would perform... and look at you now!" she wrote on X when the lineups were announced last year.
And Blackpink's Lisa - fresh off her role on the hit HBO series "White Lotus" - will be performing solo, having twice taken the stage at Coachella with her bandmates.
Later in the weekend, Charli XCX is expected to color the field in her signature green after a hit year in which her latest album launched her to new heights of fame.
Travis Scott will perform as a special guest following Green Day's April 12 concert, years after the hip-hop artist was announced as the headliner for the 2020 festival but ultimately dropped out due to the Covin-19 pandemic. | BGNES