Posted on 06/30/2009 10:53:20 AM PDT by a fool in paradise
It was billed as three days of peace and music, but the Woodstock Music and Art Fair was really the culmination of months of planning, begging, borrowing and countless hours of hard work. To mark the 40th anniversary of that historic concert, the man at the heart of it all, Michael Lang the producer who co-created Woodstock peels back the curtain and reveals the stories and the passion behind one of rock's most powerful moments.
Lang and Holly George-Warren deliver The Road to Woodstock on June 30, but here they give RollingStone.com a first look at some of its revelations. Lang recounts his first meeting with Max Yasgur, the dairy farmer who invited a nation of music-hungry kids to his upstate New York farm. He recalls how he courted Bob Dylan, and why the legend didn't make it to the Woodstock stage that weekend. He also explains how he avoided losing the Grateful Dead and the Who at the 11th hour, and describes the moment that Sly and the Family Stone elevated the festival to another plane.
Read on for these and more personal stories from the man who took Woodstock from vision to rock history.
...The Who Cement Their Place in Rock History
It was three thirty in the morning and the Who were about to go on, so I said, "Look, Abbie, whoever you saw is gone, so let's just go watch some music and chill out for a few minutes."
He agreed and we headed back up to the stage to sit with musicians from various groups who'd gathered to watch. Abbie kept fidgeting next to me. He couldn't stop talking. "I've really gotta say something about John Sinclair! He's rotting in prison for smoking a joint!" Sinclair, the manager of the radical Detroit rock band the MC5 and the founder of the White Panther Party, was set up by the cops and sentenced to ten years in prison for the possession of two joints.
"Okay, Abbie," I tried to reason with him, "there will be a chance later on, between sets or something."
But he persisted. "No, I really gotta say something! Now!"
"Abbie, the Who is on," I reminded him they were about halfway through performing Tommy in its entirety, so I don't know how he failed to notice. "You can't make a speech in the middle of their set let them finish! Chill out!"
Just after "Pinball Wizard," Abbie leaped up before I could grab him and rushed to Townshend's mic, while Pete had his back turned and was adjusting his amp. Abbie started earnestly beseeching the audience to think about John Sinclair, who needed our help. He was in his element, berating everyone for having a good time. "Hey, all you people out there having fun while John Sinclair is being held a political prisoner . . ." WHAM! Townshend, turning back to the audience and seeing Abbie at his mic, whacked him in the head with his guitar.
Abbie stumbled, then jumped to the photographer's pit, dashed over the fence, and vanished into the crowd below. A pretty dramatic exit. That was the last I saw of him that weekend.
HENRY DILTZ: I was right in front of the Who, on the lip of the stage. There was Roger Daltrey, with his fringes flying. Abbie Hoffman ran onto the stage and Pete Townshend took his guitar and held it straight out, perfectly, with the neck toward the guy, just like a bayonet, and went klunk. I thought he killed him. Early in the set, Townshend had already kicked Michael Wadleigh in the chest while the director crouched in front of him with his camera. Now Townshend was over the top with fury. "The next f***ing person who walks across this stage is going to get f***ing killed!" he yelled as he retuned his Gibson SG. The audience at first thought he was joking and started laughing and clapping. "You can laugh," he said coldly, "but I mean it!"
PETE TOWNSHEND: My response was reflexive rather than considered. What Abbie was saying was politically correct in many ways. The people at Woodstock really were a bunch of hypocrites claiming a cosmic revolution simply because they took over a field, broke down some fences, imbibed bad acid, and then tried to run out without paying the bands. All while John Sinclair rotted in jail after a trumped-up drug bust. The Who continued with their exhilarating performance of Tommy, and just as the sun rose, they played raucous rock and roll classics from their days as mods: "Summertime Blues," "Shakin' All Over," and "My Generation." They were astonishing. Later, I couldn't believe the band thought they were subpar and that the audience didn't get into Tommy.
PETE TOWNSHEND: Tommy wasn't getting to anyone. By [the end of the set], I was about awake, we were just listening to the music when all of a sudden, bang! The fucking sun comes up! It was just incredible. I really felt we didn't deserve it, in a way. We put out such bad vibes and as we finished it was daytime. We walked off, got in the car, and went back to the hotel. It was f***ing fantastic.
BILL GRAHAM: The Who were brilliant. Townshend is like a locomotive when he gets going. He's like a naked black stallion. When he starts, look out.
ROGER DALTREY: We did a two-and-a-half-hour set . . . It made our career. We were a huge cult band, but Woodstock cemented us to the historical map of rock and roll.
--- Rolling Stone article of excerpts from the forthcoming The Road to Woodstock by Michael Lang with Holly George-Warren, Ecco/HarperCollins, © 2009 (used with permission)
But with 300 live performances, the notion of a “shared event” is lost.
It’s like a bar with an internet jukebox. A bar that selected 100 singles for the system (or later 100 CDs) had much more control over the sound and feel of the establishment.
SXSW in Austin has 2,000+ bands giving 10,000+ performances over 5 days (many free, but also many nighttime performaces with $150 wristband or $20 cover charge admission). It is the ultimate of “choose your own adventure” festivals, no two people have the same experience, even when they go to see the same performer or even the same performance.
With all due respect - most of the other acts besides The Who sucked.
CSNY - lefties with nice voices and some nice songs. Crosby’s pinnacle was The Byrds mainly due to Roger aka Jim McGuinn.
Jimi - A bit overrated in my mind. Ditto pot head Santana.
Creedence - some liked them but not me.
Blood Sweat & Tears - not that bad and not hippie America haters.
Edgar Winter & Joe Cocker - okay.
Sha Na Na - WTf were they doin there instead of philly.
The rest of the groups were crap or lefties.
Thanks for the list. It reinforces my earlier thoughts that Woodstock, with the execption of The Who, was a huge waste of time instead of a major cultural event.
It was more a masturbatory event for Baby Boomers to remind how special and important they are.
The Who and Pete Townsend get extra gold stars for Pete hitting Abbe Hoffman over the head with his Gibson SG. If only he had hit him even harder. ;-)
If you can remember Woodstock, you weren’t there.
Amen man. Let me tell that playing 2 1/2 hours at 4 am was probably not a lot of fun.
Pete Townsend had some recent problems with his web browsing activities but The Who’s music was top notch.
The rest of the group were lefty hippies or talentless scum. Townsend hitting Abbe Hoffman was priceless. I get the impression the whole thing was rather unpleasant for The Who including getting their drinks spiced with drugs.
Most of the American bands during the era were crap. The Byrds were good not due to Crosby but McGuinn.
Just rich snotty CA kids like Jefferson Airplane and The Dead who made crap music. They probably would have ended up in the Manson family. Probably most had trust funds.
There were hundreds of hours film shot (multiple cameras shooting many songs from different angles, plus interviews and site coverage) as well as at least one person on scene shooting video. And yet the footage of Abbie Hoffman getting thwacked apparently was missed.
I hear it can be heard on a bootleg audio of the Who performance.
In the book on the film, they discuss how there were a couple of production screenings of the full Woodstock footage on multiple cameras in sequence (ran something like 18 hours) and they laid "in the round" when they viewed the clips. They were watching it altogether to determine which shots and performances to use for the feature.
In Target they run an ad on the TV’s for the remix of Woodstock by Martin Scrosese. I like a lot of his work but I could not be bother to watch this except maybe The Who. Dirty spoiled and self important hippies.
I like John Lydon (aka Johnny Rotten) of the Sex Pistols (SP) because he despised hippies including Richard Branson (aka Weirdy Beardy) who’s Virgin label was their final home.
Lydon is a real libertarian and liked Newt. Only band that had an anti-abortion song (Bodies) which he claimed was neither pro or anti just pro-responsibility. Imagine that - the most famous punk band ever at about 18 years old writing & singing songs about personal responsibility while hippie bands preached the opposite!
The Gibson SG is a pretty solid piece of wood. I would rather go to the dentist than watch Woodstock. I would watch The Who.
Johnny from his pre-punk days when he was a roadie for Hawkwind.
LOL! Well at least he had good taste (sort of) with Hawkwind. Robert Calvert and I think Lemmie on bass. LOL! He must have been 15.
Yep. Lemmy. Motorhead was originally the name of a Hawkwind song.
And going back to Isle of Wight festival, the Deviants played outside the gates to the anarchists who tried but couldn’t get in.
I think there is some shared lineage between the Deviants, Pink Fairies, and Hawkwind.
The sound are somewhere between the Stooges and Pink Floyd.
I am not exactly in the camp that Pet Sounds was one of the greatest rock albums ever made. Brian’s dad or was it grandad was almost like Joe Jackson (Michael’s dad) but not as bad.
Most people share that view.
Ray and/or Dave Davies would have gladly cleaned Abbie Hoffman’s clock too, given the opportunity, I feel comfortable saying.
Brian’s dad had to be every bit as bad. Brian is deaf in one ear from being popped in the head. His dad forced Brian to deficate on a plate in front of the family one night because of an argument at the dinner table.
He’d whack Dennis Wilson with a belt in the bathtub because he could run away in there.
Stooges and Pink Floyd = that would be interesting. I was somehow got on Blender’s mailing list and they were sending the magazine for free to boost their circulation.
They had a story about the guitarist in the Stooges Ron or Dave - who died recently. i got the impression that Iggy aka James Osterberg was more middle class or upscale. He chased chicks and was more of a jock. The Stooges were like lazy trailer park low lifes.
Pink Floyd - well that is a lifetime story with lots of business and psychological issues. Also possibly one of the most literate bands as Gilmour was fluent in French and they were laregly from Oxford.
One of the financially most successful groups ever but it looked like most of the time it was very unpleasant. Poor Rick Wright died recently and appeared to suffer greatly under the tyranny of Roger. Rog another mega millionaire lefty and Bush hater.
LOL! Love Dave and Ray. Ray got them banned by getting into it with the creepy stage workers union thugs. The Kinks getting banned from the USA is what really helped The Who in the USA.
The Kink rows between Dave, Ray and drummer Mick Avory were legendary. Mick bashing Dave over the head after Dave trashed his drums in Cardiff, Wales. Mick runs away from the gig.
A sibling rivalry to end all sibling rivalries.
CCR ; Jimi Hendrix ; Ten Years After ; Johnny Winter ; Sly and The Family Stone ; Santana ; Jefferson Airplane ; The Band ; Canned Heat ; Grateful Dead ...
But The Who was my main impetus for hitching rides with a buddy at age 17 from eastern Conn. to Woodstock . And we bought tickets in advance . I believe 25,000 were sold . We know how many folks showed up .
Eew. What a creep. I knew he was pretty bad but not that bad. Wow.
Jacko’s dad yesetrday was interviewed and they had the video on the net. He was talking about projects and the new video and the funeral was a side issue. I think the father is thinking he is the new Michael. The whole Jackson clan are vultures.
Saw a Youtube video recently with Dave. Apparently they’re doing a gig somewheres and one thing leads to another and Dave knocks Ray out cold. Dave gets a little concerned and leans down to see if Ray is OK. At which point Ray comes to, and cold cocks Dave. I know this is true, cause I saw Dave himself telling the story LOL.
Yes it is a true story. I saw the video with dave telling it. Funny.
I have one of their paperbacks Well Respected Gentleman. Most of it is pretty funny. I loved the story of the young Kinks stunning The older Beatles when You Really Got Me went to #1 out of the blue. John and Paul cornered ray before one of the gigs they played together and they had some snide comments.
Dave was incredibly young when they hit it big. Maybe 16 or barely 17.
All this says is you have a very narrow (miniscule ?) range of appreciation.
We used to sing Country Joe & the Fish's "Fixin' to Die Rag" in Army basic training. Our company didn't think it was crap. And we were all volunteers, by the way.
Crap?
Like Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young ?
Like Jimi Hendrix ?
Like Santana ?
Like Jefferson Airplane ?
Like Canned Heat ?
These were nearly all among the best bands of the time. I can't recall an act there that didn't have hits heard on the radio daily.
The Who, on the other hand, sounded off-key and tired. I just listened to them on the new 40th anniversary DVD set.
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