Oh yeah, I forgot about the Beatles.
But all the stuff from Woodstock, the Doors, Stevie Wonder, Chicago, Steely Dan, Blood Sweat and Tears, The Allman Brothers, Jimi Hendrix, The Who, Deep Purple, Booker T, The Eagles etc etc etc.
I’ll concede...there was a lot of crap then too. But now, that’s all you get.
Woodstock changed it. It went from being small and medium sized venues and two performances a night to bigger sports halls, reserved seating, and big corporate rock shows.
That business model isn’t working so well today (there are some very big bands, many of them decades old restricted to playing their hits from the first half of their career, and some of those song and dance light show extravaganzas with lip synching) but at the smaller end of the scale, there is no ink. Nothing for the local acts. Nothing for the venues that book up and coming touring acts. Just the Livenation outdoor sheds, sports arenas, and their house of blues chain.
Bill Graham was part of the problem. He wasn’t interested in acts that could sell out 3,000 tickets 3 nights in a row, he wanted 10-20,000 in a night.