- Corona Capital, a two-day music festival for Mexico City's expensively-sunglassed youth, is this town's version of London's Lovebox. The festival provides a weekend of urban, cross-genre, booze-filled mayhem, which many from the upper reaches of this megalopolis of more than 20 million people wait all year for.
Corona Capital is by no means free from the monotonous inevitabilities of the festival-industrial complex: its lineup includes artists like M.I.A., Deadmaus, Jimmy Eat World and The Stereophonics. There were more adventurous choices such as DJ Harvey and Giorgio Moroder, but they were neutered, either by unkind scheduling (Harvey) or by their own incredulity at suddenly, after years on the sidelines, being revered by 20,000 loved-up Chilangos (as Mexico City residents are known), and deciding to simply belt out "Call Me" over and over again (Moroder).
Much of the pre-festival chatter centred on news of the virtual kidnapping of Spanish indie band Delorean—an unsettling development that led to John Talabot pulling out. It was a shame; I was looking forward to catching the Spanish jock, and it reflected badly on Mexico City, a calm, bohemian oasis in a country that has seen roughly 80,000 drug-related murders since 2007. Mexico's drug violence cannot be ignored, but by withdrawing, I felt Talabot offered the bad-guys a gimme that will no doubt make it harder to attract top talent in the future.
In Matias Aguayo, however, Corona Capital found a more-than decent substitute. The Chilean troubadour began with a neo-be-bop scat that revealed the limits of his voice. He fared better when he simply rolled out the tunes. He would later drizzle some pleasing acid licks over the mix, but it was his presence behind the decks that really won hearts and minds. Like a Latin American Dixon, the tall, winnowy, lank-haired DJ instilled a languorous multi-culturalism into his 50-minute set.
The night before I'd managed to catch Jacques Lu Cont, or Stuart Price to his mum. I'd have thought that after producing Madonna, The Killers and The Pet Shop Boys, Lu Cont wasn't exactly desperate for the cash, but his set read like a Vegas demo tape. And with dudes like Afrojack pulling in $300,000 a night for two-hour Sin City EDM sets, who can blame him?
The other stages were mainly comprised of indie-rock mainstays—Queens Of The Stone Age, Sigur Ros, Vampire Weekend—who all delivered, despite this probably being their 187th festival gig this summer. I know I'm late to the party, but The XX, who have slyly morphed into a Coldplay-style blockbuster without losing their intimate sound, were great. As the sun set, and weed smoke filtered through the green laser beams, it was hard not to feel a tiny shudder of "fuck-me."
Corona Capital is easy to hate. With roughly half of Mexico's 115 million people living on less than $200 a month, the $7 beers indicate the festival's target audience. There was not a single Mexican musical offering on show. It was also, like most "world-class" festivals, dizzyingly corporate—at one point, a giant beach ball with the HP insignia bounced around obscuring the band playing on stage. The Mexico City leg of Mutek, which took place in the weeks before Corona Capital and featured Actress, FaltyDL, Raime and Amon Tobin, is evidence that smarter artists do come here. But Corona Capital is fun and well-catered, and it's where the handsome young people of this cool, surreal city stream out to hear bands rarely in town.