YOUR BRAIN ON COACHELLA: How Immersive Experiences Shift How You Think
ENTERING THE WORLD
Coachella reaches global audiences every year with their star-studded lineups, world-renowned food vendors and exciting celebrity attendance records. And of course there is the stigma of music festivals and the rowdy experiences people expect.
But we’re here to represent a different view. After a weekend in the desert, Sara and Isabella — your unofficial ATS field reporters — came back with one clear takeaway: When you step into a fully intentional environment, your thinking changes.
Ideas start flowing. Patterns become visible. You begin to see the decisions behind the experience. And that’s where this connects to our work.
We spend our time helping organizations do exactly this, design intentional experiences for their people through communication, culture and leadership. It may not be the masterclass that is Coachella, but it’s built on the same principles.
EVERY CHOICE IS AN ARTISTIC CHOICE
Nothing at Coachella is accidental. From the most elaborate stage production to the simplest screen text, every element answers a question: What do we want the audience to feel?
Take Sabrina Carpenter, whose show was the most highly produced we saw all weekend. The staging, the storytelling elements, the appearance of Madonna, the monologue with Geena Davis—this wasn’t just “bringing out a guest” or “doing a fun bit.” It was a deliberate story about her future self and her past self, layered with a Thelma and Louise nod for anyone who caught the reference. Every prop, every cameo and every beat was part of a larger, intentionally constructed world.
On the other end of the spectrum, you have artists like Justin Bieber, where the creative choices showed up in entirely different ways: the simplicity of the stage setup, the pacing of the songs, the way the visual and sonic elements interacted.
And it’s not just the stage builds or the props. Even the screens became a kind of personality test for each artist. Some acts filled them with abstract visuals or cinematic sequences; others used them almost like a second voice. Royel Otis, for instance, used text to frame each song: “This is a song about…,” “This is a song called…,” “This is a song we did not write” for their cover. It was funny, yes, but it also told you something about who they are—maybe they’re more introverted, maybe they don’t want to stop between every track to talk, but they still want you to feel connected and in on the joke.
Then you have a band like Turnstile, who almost completely flipped the camera away from themselves. Instead of the usual close-ups of the band, their screens focused on the crowd—the fans, the mosh pits, people losing their minds in the best way. Watching that set, you barely saw the performers at all. What you saw was energy. The message was clear: this is about ALL of us. The crowd isn’t an accessory to the show; they are the show.
The takeaway? Every decision — what you show, what you say, what you don’t — communicates something. Even what looks simple is usually the result of many tiny decisions.
This is no different inside organizations. We’re asking similar questions with every event, email and leader message:
What do we want people to feel?
What do we want them to understand?
What do we want them to do?
IMMERSIVE EXPERIENCES
Having been to Coachella before, we had mostly written off the brand activations. We were there for the music, not to stand in line for hours.
This year, though, we had some time between sets on the last day and decided to explore. What we thought would be a quick stop for a sweet treat turned into a full-blown “red carpet” experience at the Magnum Bar activation. And on the other side of the grounds, Miniverse was handing out mini versions of the iconic Coachella lineup poster, along with ice-cold Coca-Cola and a photobooth moment. Both were playful, well-executed and thoughtful, reflecting the brands and the festival-goer experience.
Then there’s the other end of the spectrum. Activations like the Sabrina speakeasy or the Gap experience had people waiting up to five hours. On a day with 10–12 hours of music, that’s a real tradeoff. Friends working on-site talked about long days, intense prep and the pressure to make those five hours “worth it” for every person in line. Behind every activation is a full team designing, coordinating and delivering hospitality at scale.
Even if we will keep choosing music over merch lines, we left with a deeper appreciation for the craft behind these moments.
These experiences are part of a larger pattern we saw all weekend: intentional design for a specific audience. You don’t have to love them (or wait in line for them) to learn from them and to see opportunities to build smaller, more intentional “activations” into everyday life and work.
THE BRAIN ON COACHELLA
By the third day of the festival, something shifted. When you fully immerse yourself in a new environment, one that is layered with story and creativity, it opens up new neural pathways. You start to think differently, make new connections, see patterns you might have missed. It also makes you realize how often your brain is running on autopilot the rest of the time.
And maybe that matters even more right now. We’re living and working through a moment that feels heavier than usual, constant information, uncertainty, competing demands. It’s easy to stay in reactive mode, moving from one thing to the next without much space to think.
Experiences like this interrupt your default thinking. They push you out of routine and into curiosity.
And it doesn’t have to be Coachella. It could be a museum, a gallery, a live performance, even a new city. The point is to step into environments where creativity, storytelling and intention are everywhere.
Sometimes the most productive thing you can do is change your surroundings and let your mind wander.
If Coachella can be a festival, a classroom and a creative reset all at once, the real opportunity is in how we build smaller, intentional versions of that feeling into our everyday lives and work, without the dust, the crowds or the five-hour lines.