Deadmau5 returned to Coachella over the weekend to play the Quasar stage on April 18 but left the platform stumbling after enjoying one too many drinks. The Canadian DJ uploaded a series of Instagram posts the following morning that included an apology for his behavior, and the admission that Coachella 2025 would probably be his last.
Deadmau5 (real name Joel Zimmerman) was on the lineup as his alter ego Testpilot, alongside electronic music artist Zhu. The pair played for multiple hours and their performance ended after Deadmau5 was seen (and heard) taking shots, falling over behind the DJ booth and slurring his speech.
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A video of the closing moments captured Zhu and Deadmau5 awkwardly exiting the stage, with the latter yelling, “They were actually like ‘That’s it!'”
In an Instagram caption the next morning, the producer-DJ wrote that he didn’t “remember a thing,” but noted that he also didn’t have a cigarette, which he vowed to quit just a week before.
“I dont remember a thing. But I don’t think I had a cig? So… that’s good I guess? Going back to bed. Wake me up around Thursday-ish,” he said in a post alongside a picture of a water bottle. “Probably my last Coachella,” he added in a comment.
He also uploaded a photo of his cat writing, “even my cat is disappointed in me.”
“Sorry about last night,” he continued. “To be fair, I felt the first 3/4 was great! Huge shout out to @zhu for introducing me to whisky and carrying my dumb ass till the bitter end. lemme quit smoking, do some fucken [sic] personal resetting here at home, find my spirit animal, work on some new music, and come back better.”
Ironically enough, Deadmau5 poked fun at Grimes when the latter put on a subpar Coachella performance last year due to technical issues. He sampled clips of Grimes addressing her fallbacks before launching into his own mixes on the last day of EDC in May.
“It’s just fun, okay? And heaven forbid we have a little fun, some screaming and some laughs at a music festival,” he told CBC at the time. “It’d be really weird if we didn’t. It’d be very unmemorable if we were all very serious.”
