Those with generous parents can add a last-minute item to their wish list: a spring weekend outside Palm Springs with singer Frank Ocean. On Friday, news broke that Ocean will headline the 2020 Coachella Music and Arts Festival alongside hip hop star Travis Scott and a reunited Rage Against the Machine, according to a report in Us Weekly.
The festival, which occur across two consecutive weekends starting on Friday, April 10, is considered the curtain-raiser for the outdoor concert season. If an act wins at Coachella, chances are that they’ll have a busy year ahead of them. Just ask 2019 Coachella headliners and buzz acts Rosalia, J Balvin, Ariana Grande, Billie Eilish and Ella Mai.
Ocean’s headlining slot will be his first Coachella performance since 2012, when he was a mid-level Odd Future member hoping for a breakout set. In the time since, he’s become one of the most influential artists of the decade, and a performer so coveted for festivals that his non-appearance at November’s Camp Flog Gnaw Carnival resulted in surprise guest star Drake being booed off the stage.
For their part, Rage Against the Machine’s appearance atop the list marks a return. The Los Angeles rap-rock band headlined the first-ever Coachella, and reunited to conquer it again in 2007. The band has been teasing a 2020 mission since autumn.
Scott first appeared at Coachella in 2017, and in the two years since has become one of pop music’s biggest draws. A Scott set in 2020 could see appearances by any of the dozens of artists with whom he’s collaborated: SZA, Post Malone, the Weeknd, Kanye West and Schoolboy Q included.
Promoter Goldenvoice has yet to officially announce the 2020 roster, a ritual that usually occurs just after the new year. But online sleuths have been tracking tour schedules, and their oft-accurate predictions have been accumulating. Those considered likely include rapper Megan Thee Stallion, My Chemical Romance, Duke Dumont, Lewis Capaldi, Flume, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard and Carly Rae Jepsen.
