Darkside's Nicolas Jaar Makes Statements on Palestine, ICE, For-Profit Prisons & More at Coachella 2025
Coachella 2025 will likely be considered one of the most political editions of the longstanding festival, with a flurry of artists using their onstage platforms to make statements on topics including Palestine, ICE, the Trump administration and more.
Nicolas Jaar of psych jam act Darkside used the trio's Saturday night performances in the Gobi tent to address the audience about a myriad of issues, primarily Palestine. Jaar began his statement by acknowledging that Southern California is the ancestral home of various Native American tribes, with many of these people killed in the mass murders of Native Americans that occurred in the 16th, 17th, 18th and 19th centuries.
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'Here were committed the genocides that are the blueprint for what's happening in Palestine right now, the same racist logic,' Jaar stated during the band's weekend 1 show, on April 12. 'We must continue resisting, even from the belly of the beast, because this genocide is funded by American money, with technology from Silicon Valley, thanks to the complicity of all the politicians in this country.'
Jaar continued by referencing Mahmoud Khalil – the detained Columbia University graduate student currently being held in an immigration detention center following his role in on-campus protests.
'I also want to say that today, these days, as some of you may know, just protesting a genocide that is happening means that you can get deported, like Mahmoud Khalil. That doesn't feel right. Mahmoud and many others are in ICE detention jails. These jails are run for profit by groups like CoreCivic and The GEO Group. They make money off of keeping people in cells. We need to keep fighting them. For the sake of everyone there stuck without trial, and with no hope, we need to give hope. Thank you, everyone.'
Jaar delivered a slightly different version of the same statement during the band's weekend 2 performance on Saturday, April 19, stating that, 'We've been on tour for about a month and a half, and during this month and a half, the administration of this country has been deporting people for their political views, they have been locking people up in ICE detention jails. The prisoner count of this country keeps on being the highest in the entire world. There's more people locked up in California than at Coachella right now, and this country keeps on arming and funding, also with tech and Silicon Valley, the genocide of the Palestinian people and arming and funding Israel's system of apartheid and ethnic cleansing.
'But the problem doesn't stop at this administration and the administration of that country,' he continued. 'It's much deeper than that… It's based off a system of racism, of ethnic cleansing both here in these lands, and also there. And there's no way to continue in this planet without the empires falling as soon as possible. In all ways possible. A lot of people tell us to shut up and just play the music, but for us, music is being together, and how can we be together if our brothers and sisters are locked up and our brothers and sisters are literally burning in their homes?'
Elsewhere at the festival's second weekend, Northern Irish hip-hop group Kneecap ended their performance with strong anti-Israel sentiments. On Friday (April 18), the Belfast trio closed their show by projecting strong messaging in support of Palestinians on their video screens. 'Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinian people,' the projected messages read. 'It is being enabled by the U.S. government who arm and fund Israel despite their war crimes. F— Israel; free Palestine.' This display came a week after the band claimed Coachella censored the pro-Palestinian messaging during their debut at the event.
On the main stage, headliners Green Day also changed the lyrics of 'American Idiot' to state 'I'm not part of the MAGA agenda.' Other artists including Bob Vylan and Blonde Redhead displayed Palestinian flags during their sets. During the performance by this latter artists, the onstage event was soundtracked by audio of Khalil. Senator Bernie Sanders also appeared onstage during Clairo's weekend 1 performance and urged festivalgoers to 'stand up and fight for justice.'
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