Japanese Breakfast impressed at last year’s Coachella. But while all eyes were on her, the artist born Michelle Zauner was distracted by an unexpected guest in the audience.
Zauner was guest for yesterday’s (March 12) episode of the Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend podcast, and the two rehashed how they became acquainted “a number of months ago.”
O’Brien shared that his daughter, Neve, invited him to attend Coachella with her. In the car, she played him the bands scheduled to play at the festival without revealing any of their identities to O’Brien. She tasked her dad with choosing which sets they should see.
“She’s playing me all different kinds of music, and I’m saying, ‘I like this one. I like that band. Yeah, this one should be good,'” O’Brien told Zauner. “And then I singled out — she played me a couple songs, and I said, ‘This is the band we have to see. We have to see this band.’ And she said, ‘Correct! That is Japanese Breakfast!'”
So, Conan and Neve predictably went to Japanese Breakfast’s Mojave tent set, where O’Brien was mesmerized by Zauner’s use of a gong during “Paprika.” All the while, Zauner was mesmerized by O’Brien in the VIP area at the side of the stage.
“It was hard to not just, like, look at you when we were playing because we were all just like, ‘Oh my god, Conan O’Brien is watching us play,'” Zauner said. “And so, I felt like I really had to perform for you. I feel like I was just watching you and hoping that you didn’t walk away. That was like my marker. But then, in retrospect, I feel like that must have uncomfortable — to be someone’s focal point.”
Maybe Conan and Neve will attend one of Zauner’s upcoming stops on her Crying In H Mart book tour beginning on March 27 in Brooklyn, New York.
Watch the Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend clip above.
