Three days of peace, love and music: a historical phrase that was never supposed to be turned over to history. Three days of three words that have transformed into a worldwide hypothetical, although it was once a reality hoped by many to live on longer than a weekend in August, 1969.
Woodstock 1969 lives on a pedestal in pop-culture history, “synonymous with the counterculture movement of the 1960s,” as History calls it. The festival began on August 15th, welcoming half a million people onto its dairy farm venue in Bethel, New York.
Woodstock’s official website reads: “Fifty years later, there are anniversary celebrations of Woodstock large and small taking place throughout the country and around the world, along with new films, music, books and socially responsible products. 2019 is confirming what we all feel: the spirit of Woodstock is alive and flourishing.”
These “large and small” celebrations worldwide are great, I’m sure, if you know where to find them. But unfortunately the biggest and most anticipated anniversary celebration of all came crashing down in the same unorganized and questionable way that it began.
In the summer of 2019, everyone could have really benefitted from some peace, love, and music. History seems to be repeating itself, with separation and conflict based on race and sexuality; not to mention the messiest government the United States has seen in a while. It's amazing what a little bit of music, and a little bit of community can give to a nation. Unfortunately, we'll have to find a plan B. Thanks for trying, Woodstock.
To understand how it all went down, let’s start at the beginning- because the technicalities of Woodstock were almost never all “peace and love.”
1969-Peace, Love, and Music
The four founders of Woodstock, a group of underprepared 20-somethings, had no real qualifications to make anyone believe they could successfully plan a music festival. They just sort of landed on the concert after cycling through other ideas like building a music studio and filming a sitcom. The four were basically eeny, meeny, miny, moeing on what to do with their money- the only thing they DID have.
Woodstock Music & Art Festival was held August 15th-18th, 1969 on a dairy farm owned by Max and Miriam Yasgur. Planners of the festival told these lovely dairy farm owners (whom, by the way, were not expecting to host Woodstock until just a few short weeks before), that they expected no more than 50,000 attendees. The festival was originally supposed to take place in Wallkill, NY, but residence protested, giving the planners six weeks to find a new venue.
The overwhelming amount of people that showed up to the final farm destination was what made the concert “free,” as all the articles claim the concert was. How could anyone keep track of the payment of 500,000 unexpected hippies?
Over a period of three days, 32 artists and bands performed on the Woodstock stage, including Joan Baez, The Who, Santana, the Grateful Dead, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Janis Joplin, Sly and the Family Stone, The Band, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, and Jimi Hendrix.
The road to the show looked like a hippie apocalypse. Cars were lined up from 15 miles away in every direction of the venue. Concert-comers ended up parking their cars on the side of any road they could find with space, and finishing the remaining 15 mile hike to the show on foot.
Aside from the horrible traffic issues, there were several other factors that drew away from the festival's image of peace and love. For one thing, there was only one toilet available per every 833 people. Not the absolute worst thing, but how long were people actually able to hold it before they gave up and took their business to the small amount of open space there was between the attendees, cars, and tents?
There was also an extreme amount of open drug use. For those planning on getting high, it was a great time. For those who were not planning on getting high...well, they got high anyway.
"Outside [the tent] they were giving out electric Kool-Aid laced with whatever," a nurse told the Times Herald-Record. "Now, when kids take a tab of acid, they know what they're getting into. When you drink something that's cold because you're thirsty, that's different.”
One attendee on the grounds died due to a drug overdose, and another accidentally by being run over by a tractor, after a good night’s rest in a sleeping bag placed behind the wheels of the vehicle. Although still tragic, it’s almost unbelievable that only two lives were taken out of 500,000.
Still, the attendees were overall surprisingly peaceful, and gave the 1960’s the grand finale it deserved. “I’d never been with so many people, who were all there for the same thing which is music, peace and love, and that was very life-changing,” Onondaga Hill resident Dave Tiedemann told syracuse.com.
Such a historic event calls not only for a 50th anniversary event, but for a 25th and 30th as well. Unfortunately, Woodstock 1999 was the type of misadventure that organizers should have learned from in preparation for Woodstock 50.
1994- The Muddy Middle Child
Yes, there was a Woodstock 25th anniversary, and it ran surprisingly smoothly, which is probably why no one talks about it. It had 300,000+ attendees. Security was tight, the weather was bad, attendees enjoyed themselves, and Ultimate Classic Rock called it the “middle child between the peaceful original 1969 concert and 1999’s disaster.”
1999- The Disaster
Instead of becoming the amazing 30th anniversary of peace and love, Woodstock 1999 came to be known as “the day the 90’s died,” as confirmed by Vice, Rolling Stone, and Festi.World, to name a few. The anticipated celebratory festival became a pricy, angry, and traumatic shit show, for lack of better, accurate adjectives.
No available water might be one of the better problems of Woodstock 1999. The few public water fountains were either knocked down causing flooding, or attendees would have to be willing to wait in the hour long lines to get a “1, 2, 3, save some for me” sip of water. Water bottles were limited, and sold for $4 a pop. After the festival, lawyers of some festival-goers threatened to sue organizers for negligence. The even worse issues that hit Woodstock 1999 were in the form of runaway cops, fire outbreaks, and sexual assaults.
When the Red Hot Chili Peppers performed a cover of “Fire” by Jimi Hendricks, the angry crowd took it as their cue to rage. Rolling Stone said, “Bonfires broke out throughout the crowd. Vehicles were flipped and set ablaze. Vendor booths and merch tents were destroyed and used as fuel. Eventually, the New York State Troopers and local law enforcement were able to diffuse the riots, but Griffiss Air Force Base still ended up looking like a bomb hit it.”
The sexual assault issues brought this festival to a new level of horrible, from the crowd shouting “show your tits” at every woman to walk across the stage, to the terrifying gang rape that somehow no one was able to stop. Through the midst of it all, the Woodstock website found it appropriate to post a series of photos of topless women at the festival without their knowledge or consent. Of the 44 people arrested at Woodstock ’99, only one was charged with sexual assault.
2019- A Failed Attempt
“You can’t ‘magic’ one of these [Woodstocks] into happening, and that’s what they tried to do with this,” David Crosby, one of the veterans of the first Woodstock who was booked for the anniversary festival, told Rolling Stone.
Rolling Stone wrote out their whole investigation, calling Woodstock 50 “a slow-moving train wreck,” after “three months of reporting, nearly 100 legal filings, and dozens of interviews."
So, here is my gift to you, faithful Sound Hammock readers: a sorted “brief” for you to understand what happened to Woodstock 50 in 1500 real-people words, instead of Rolling Stone’s legal-worded 9000, although it is quite impressive. Click here for Rolling Stone's full story.
*Credit must be given to Rolling Stone writers/investigators David Browne and Kory Grow for their incredible dedication to entertainment, story telling, and the hard truth.
“It’s the story of how the Age of Aquarius turned into the Age of Mercury in Retrograde — and the unfulfilled promises left in its wake.” -Rolling Stone
Michael Lang, the co-founder of Woodstock 1969, was in discussion with a racetrack in upstate New York in December 2018, hoping to hold the anniversary concert here almost exactly 50 years after the original event. He had also begun negotiations with Dentsu Aegis, an international media company, to finance the event. Every company/person Lang partnered with to become “Woodstock 50 LCC” had no past experience with staging a music festival.
Lang told D.J. Martin, the company’s chief commercial officer of Dentsue, that he was imagining a crowd of 150,000. Dentsu predicted government permits would cap attendance at 60,000. Martin advised Lang in an email to clarify the facts of the numbers to the collective team, and warns him that they could end up in bad shape very quickly.
Time check: 10 months till show time
Lang inspected the grounds of the racetrack that winter, and organizers said they were working to obtain a mass-gathering permit from the state to allow on-site camping- a law put in place in 1970 after the original Woodstock.
“Woodstock 50’s contract with Dentsu Aegis said that the financier would contribute up to $49,141,000 to the festival, based on the assumption that a maximum of 150,000 tickets could be sold. An additional $22 million would come from corporate sponsorships,” said Rolling Stone.
The flawed strategy they set to sign talent for the show was an early hint at the money they could lose if they didn’t plan this thing right. At the top of the wanted performers list were:
“Beyoncé and Bruce Springsteen, along with “Drake (or Kendrick Lamar),” Bruno Mars (whom they earmarked for a “special Sly and the Family Stone tribute”), “Lady Gaga (or Pink or Katy Perry),” and finally “Stevie Wonder + Friends” (whom they suggested would pay tribute to Aretha Franklin and bring “his Hall of Fame friends to join him [for] a one-time-only W50 set”). Other hoped-for performances that never materialized included Green Day playing all of American Idiot, My Morning Jacket performing a “special tribute to the Band,” and, as Lang told Rolling Stone, a collaboration between Miley Cyrus and the Grateful Dead’s Bob Weir. (“There was no actual discussion,” a source in the Dead camp tells Rolling Stone.)”
“What happens if they all say yes?” Martin asked, adding that the artists selected up to that point would cost “$19 million alone.” Long story short, Martin said hell no.
Martin later attested that Woodstock 50 “had not secured a single artist to play the festival” by the New Years Eve deadline they had perviously discussed.
On January 7th, Dentsu hired Superfly, the production company known for putting together big music festivals like Bonaroo and Outside Lands, to oversee the planning of Woodstock 50. FINALLY they had someone who knew what they were doing! However, the anniversary was:
Time check: 9 short months away.
Lang went into the Rolling Stone office at this time, and claimed that they had 40 acts signed up. Come to find out, he had bigger plans than even that.
“He [Lang] envisioned “these neighborhoods, which [would] have curated food and music and entertainment experiences.” There would be “street actors, clowns, and jugglers, and the like” along with a “kind of drive-in-movie situation, or a walk-in-movie situation.” There was talk of a livestream and a concert movie. Lang even said they had tracked down odor-free toilets.”
At a later court hearing, Dentsu would be asked how much time would generally be needed for this kind of preparation, to which they replied, “A minimum of a year to 18 months.”
Time check: 7 months till show time.
Meanwhile, the logistics of the project were becoming a bit unclear. Since Lang investigated the venue in the Winter, Superfly couldn’t get an accurate look at the grounds, and relied on Google Maps for planning. Once the snow melted, the company realized the land was hardly functional.
Woodstock 50 was still struggling to get a mass-gathering permit, which held them from putting tickets on sale. Lang said that much of the legal action was "just busy work.”
In March, the lineup was finally revealed at a Manhattan press conference which alone cost $120,000. There were no crazy reunions presented, but it was a pretty good list of modern hit-makers, such as Jay-Z, Chance the Rapper, Miley Cyrus, and the Black Keys, with Woodstock vets including Crosby, Carlos Santana, and Dead & Company.
Every act was paid at least $500,000 in advance. A court filing stated, “Dentsu had no option but to make these payments after a damaging rumor leaked to the public that the festival was experiencing financial difficulties, threatening [its] success.”
Due to Superfly’s “discomfort” in the business plans, they wanted to cap the attendees at 65,000. Lang was extremely displeased, expressing so in an email stating he was disappointed in their “lack of effort to solve problems.” Superfly wouldn’t budge.
Time check: 5 months till show time.
At a town hall meeting in Watkins Glen, the town where Woodstock 50 was to be held, Lang failed to win over Watkins Glen officials, whose job it was to get the necessary permits. The officials limited the attendance to 75,000 ticket-holders; 10,000 more than Superfly’s estimate, but still not good enough for Lang.
Time Check: 4 months till show time
The first “public cracks” appeared in April, when the Black Keys dropped out, claiming “schedule conflicts.” Next, the on-sale date for tickets came and went with no official press statement.
Superfly suddenly decided that Watkins Glen could only host 61,000 people- 4,000 fewer than it had originally projected. In a letter to Woodstock 50, Superfly said it “will not go forward” with any planning that did not line up with that new number.
Dentsu had now spent $32 million on talent, leaving only one third of the original budget remaining. With the new numbers, tickets still not on sale, and tension between companies, the festival no longer seemed realistically profitable. There was a push for Dentsu to put tickets on sale, but they refused.
On April 29th, Superfly and Lang were still trying to figure out the logistics and make this happen, despite their disagreements. Dentsue, on the other hand, seemed to suddenly have stronger doubts. Dentsue issued this statement with no warning:
“Despite our tremendous investment of time, effort, and commitment, we don’t believe the production of the festival can be executed as an event worthy of the Woodstock brand name while also ensuring the health and safety of the artists, partners, and attendees,” Dentsue’s note read. “As a result and after careful consideration, Dentsu Aegis Network’s Amplifi Live, a partner of Woodstock 50, has decided to cancel the festival. As difficult as it is, we believe this is the most prudent decision for all parties involved.”
Lang claimed he had no heads up about the announcement. He kept his faith and was able to stay incredibly calm in the months prior- now, he was “furious.”
Superfly soon cut ties with Lang and Woodstock 50. The whole project seemed to be crashing down, but still, Lang remained persistent. (Impressive, Lang.) However, once the word got out to the artists and managers that Dentsu attempted to cancel the event, things got messier.
“I remember reading a while ago that they didn’t have some of the permits,” Fogerty, who was supposed to be one of the returning Woodstock performers, told Rolling Stone in April. “That just blew my mind. You’d think it would be the first thing you’d do and not the last thing. You got the sense there was some shakiness to this whole thing.”
According to Billboard, agents kept the news on the hush-hush to see how the organizers would respond. If they kept the date on the calendar, the artist wouldn’t have to return the money they were paid. The Woodstock 50 team was fighting for the festival’s life.
Lang saw that Dentsu had quietly taken $17.8 million out of the account for the event, and on May 8th, a complaint was officially filed with the Supreme Court of the State of New York. “Woodstock 50 LLC accused Dentsu of attempting to kill the festival and demanded the return of the $17.8 million that had been taken out of the account.”
Dentsue shot back, “Woodstock 50 LLC’s (‘W50’) and Michael Lang’s misrepresentations, incompetence, and contractual breaches, have made it impossible to produce a high-quality event that is safe and secure for concertgoers, artists, and staff … There is no prospect for sufficient financing.”
The case went to court that month, still unbeknown to the public that Woodstock 50 was hanging on by it’s last life line. The judge decided that Dentsu did not have the right to claim the cancelation of the event, nor did Lang have the right to be paid the nearly $18 million back. The concert was still on, as long as they could find a new influx of cash.
Time check: 2 months till show time
On June 10th, Watkins Glen announced that it was withdrawing as the venue of Woodstock 50. Still, there was no communication between Lang and the artists.
Next, CID, the company brought in to assist with travel and accommodations backed out. At the same time, the New York State Department of Health revoked the festival’s permit application.
Rolling Stone asked at this point how the planning was going, to which Lang replied, “Oh, not too bad. All things considered.” This was around the same time Jay-Z quietly dropped out.
Permit deadlines were coming close, and the town hall began to get cold feet, understandably, claiming that “No matter how good the plan looks on paper, to implement this plan in 39 days is impossible to ensure the safety of the public.”
A big concern was how people would leave at the end of the night, now that there was no camping permit. However, with only around 60,000 attendees Woodstock 50 LCC said it wouldn’t have been much different from any other concert or sporting event.
The following day, the town denied Woodstock 50’s permit application.
Time check: 3 weeks till show time
On July 26th, about three weeks before Woodstock 50 was scheduled to open its doors somewhere, the Department of Health officially denied a permit for the show in Vernon, the new spot Lang was hoping would be the home of Woodstock 50.
With the news of Lang’s last-hope-vision in Vernon being denied, his dream of Woodstock 50 had tragically, but finally officially come to an end.
On July 25th, Woodstock 50 freed all the artists from their contracts.
So much went wrong in the planning of the Woodstock 50th anniversary concert, it’s impossible to pinpoint the main issue. There was a whole mess of relationships, payment issues, and all together organization problems that led to the downfall of Woodstock's 50th anniversary show.
The issues were nothing new, and now seeing the bumpy road of planning that every Woodstock event had experienced, it's no surprise that one finally fell apart. Maybe there was only ever supposed to be one Woodstock, and the following events never made it because it just didn't have the same push behind it.
Although Woodstock 1969 had its own issues, the main motivation was to bring people together in peace and love, and to celebrate music. It wasn't about money. People were't hoping to see some naked ladies or planning to revolt against the system. It was about the music, the peace, the togetherness, and I guess a little bit about the drugs, but that's alright- It was the summer of 1969.