http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2009/07/10/entertainment/e042231D98.DTL
By MICHAEL HILL, Associated Press Writer
Friday, July 10, 2009
"The Road to Woodstock" (Ecco, 304 pages, $29.99), by Michael Lang:
Former headshop owner Michael Lang had scant promotional experience
when he dreamed up Woodstock as a massive festival different from
anything before it. As this memoir released 40 years later makes
clear, it's a wonder that Woodstock even happened at all.
Lang and his partners were kicked out of the initial concert site at
the last minute, sending Lang scrambling through nearby Sullivan
County to look for an emergency replacement. He found a gently
sloping hay field owned by dairy farmer Max Yasgur who, luckily for
Lang, was a friendly sort eager to accept these long-haired kids.
Meanwhile, renowned promoter Bill Graham, not wanting the
competition, threatened to shut Woodstock down. Yippie leader Abbie
Hoffman did too, unless Lang and his partners coughed up $20,000 for
leftist activities. The promoters gave him $10,000. (Hoffman went on
to spend nights leading up to the concert taking down newly installed
fences. His Woodstock adventure ended abruptly when he tried to make
an announcement during the Who's set and Pete Townshend whacked him
on the head with his guitar.)
This is an oft-told tale, but Lang keeps it interesting with
insider's tidbits. The original plan was to have off-duty New York
City cops wear pith helmets and provide security before the police
commissioner forbade it. Richie Havens didn't want to open the
concert his enduring claim to fame because he feared the crowd
would throw beer cans at him. Lang not only failed to land Bob Dylan,
but also Roy Rogers. He wanted the cowboy crooner to sing "Happy
Trails" at the end of the concert (yes, he would have followed Jimi
Hendrix's "The Star-Spangled Banner.")
Lang, who wrote the book with Holly George-Warren, comes off in this
book as a pleasant hippie hustler, unflappable in the face of looming
disasters. His narrative is broken up throughout the book with brief
testimonies from other people involved with Woodstock.
Some of the interviews with long-dead participants like the Grateful
Dead's Jerry Garcia are years old. And about half read like filler.
There are great stories in there, though, like the high school kids
who pretended they were rock stars to get choppered into the concert
over the hopelessly clogged roads.
The best part of the book is Lang's blow-by-blow account of watching
all his carefully laid plans go south in spectacular fashion over the
weekend of the concert. There were too many people, too few roads,
too much rain, no fence, no ticket takers. It could have been an
unmitigated disaster, but Lang and his 400,000-plus guests decided to
roll with it, assuring Woodstock a spot in history.
.
1 comments:
I am disappointed to learn that the 40th anniversary concerts staged for the US - the 2nd was in support of climate change - have been cancelled due to the expense of producing them. It amazes me how much the original concert cost to put on - how much the artists demanded to play. Surely it is possible to get artists to donate their time or play at a reduced rate for a cause as crucial as climate change? I would. (Scientists now say we have about 10 years to greatly diminish CO2 levels before the coral reefs disappear -they could be the first global eco-system to collapse.)
I have just released an upbeat version of Joni's Woodstock on my new CD Honey and Holy Water, my way of urging us to get back to the garden... You might want to have a listen here http://www.reverbnation.comww.reverbnation.com/oonamcouat or here http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oonamcouat:
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