So what became of the giant pig that floated off during Roger Waters’ climactic set at the Coachella Festival on Sunday? The pig that prompted a $10,000 reward for its return? It’s been found. Even now, though, some mysteries remain: Did the pig “escape,” as stated in the press release offering the reward money, or was it liberated? Who, exactly, wanted the porcine porker back? (And by the way, which one’s Pink? Sorry, we got off track there.)

First, the find. Susan Stoltz, a resident of La Quinta, one of the towns adjoining the festival grounds in the California desert, got up Monday morning and decided to take a jog. She put on—irony alert!—a Pink Floyd T-shirt. It’s not that she’s a fan; she bought it a couple of years ago for a 1970s theme party. In the driveway, she found a “huge pile of vinyl and latex,” which she and her husband stuffed into the trash.  Tuesday morning, she went out to her driveway and found another surprise—the front page of the local Desert Sun newspaper, with a story about the wayward pig and the $10,000 finder’s fee. (Waters, a  left-wing Brit, has used the floating pig as a symbol for
right-wing forces since he first started setting ‘em aloft during Pink
Floyd shows in the late ‘70s.) Suddenly, Stoltz realized what she had, and so did a neighbor, who’d found the other half of the pig. They e-mailed the address listed in the story: lostpig@coachella.com. “I told them it it was more like pulled pork now—it was pretty shredded—but they said they’d be right out to get it,” Stoltz says. Within hours, she was being besieged by local media: “A lot of people think it’s pretty funny that this capitalist pig landed in a country club in [the] Palm Springs [area].”

But who wanted the pig back, and how did it get away from the
wranglers who led it through the crowd, on ropes? Many people
believed that it accidentally drifted away, but Waters, it seems,
sometimes lets  the pigs drift up toward the dark side of the moon
after they’ve served their purpose at outdoor gigs. (At indoor arena
shows, his pigs fly around with motors, via remote control.) Wikipedia
has a very revealing page about “Inflatable pigs on Roger Waters’ tours” (not to be confused with the page on “Pink Floyd pigs,”
which goes into the contractual disputes Waters had with his former
bandmates over who got to inherit the original pig’s design attributes).
Apparently Waters mass-produces his floating props now, and each one is
individually spray-painted with topical graffiti prior to each
evening’s show. This one had a pro-Obama slogan painted on its
underbelly. Considering that Waters was also rumored to be behind a botched drop of Obama flyers at the festival,
which blew into the yards of neighboring communities instead of landing
on festival goers, is it possible the shredded pig was blown out of the
sky by a Clinton or McCain supporter with a rocket launcher? (Or maybe
a vacationing David Gilmour?)

Anyhow, if we’re to assume that Waters didn’t need this pig back any
more than any of his others, who did? Marcee Rondan, a publicist for
the festival, says that the concert promoter, Goldenvoice, put up the
reward money because the pig is "a part of Coachella lore." Waters’
nearly three-hour set, Rondan says, was the first two-parter in the
nine-year history of the event."Maybe they’ll find a way to utilize it
in the festival’s arts display" in the future, she says. (Or maybe Paul
Tollett, the cofounder of Coachella and head of Goldenvoice, who’s
reportedly a Floyd fan, will just fly it over his next cookout.)

If they can patch it together. Stoltz says she and her neighbor were
told by the retrieving forces that they thought the two pieces
represented "90 percent, if not all, of the pig." Part of her reward
included lifetime passes to Coachella, but, she admits, "I’m not really
part of that crowd." However, she was already planning on going this
weekend to Coachella’s sister festival, Stagecoach, which focuses on
country acts. Look for the woman in the Pink Floyd T-shirt.

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Playing the part of a bad-boy rocker sometimes involves a little method acting. Stone Temple Pilots frontman Scott Weiland was recently sentenced to 192 hours in jail for a November 2007 DUI in Los Angeles. EW has now learned exclusively that the singer will serve his sentence, which the judge ordered he do before May 28, and be out in time to commence the band’s 65-date reunion tour, which kicks off May 17 in Columbus, Ohio. Weiland’s lawyer confirmed this with EW via Weiland’s spokesperson. A statement from Weiland should be released soon, along with further details.

STP sold some 35 million records starting in the early 1990s and had 15 top-ten hits; Weiland, 40, recently left rock supergroup Velvet Revolver to rejoin his old band after a five-year break. They will spend the summer on the road before possibly returning to the studio this fall for their first album of original material since 2001. In addition, Weiland has a solo album due later this year. As the singer told EW earlier this month: "We still have a lot of music in us. I don’t want to wear out our welcome, but we’ll know when it’s time to go." To read a full feature story on Weiland and STP, check out the next issue of EW, hitting newsstands and EW.com on Friday, May 2. —Leah Greenblatt

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