Woodstock

Tales of the Ancient Rocker -- Woodstock

'Nothing but peace, love, music, and a mud amalgam being ground into your assorted holes'

One thing the "Woodstock Nation" propagandists left out of the travel brochures is that when you get half a million people braving a downpour to play in the mud of an immense cow pasture while the vaguely heard thump of a rhythm section pounds in the distance like thunder in the next county, what they are playing in ain't exactly "mud." The gee-whiz writers for Look, Time, Newsweek, and God-knows-how-many other mainstream media sources left out the contribution made by the cows. I guess they thought it was more acceptable to Mom and Pop to know that their half-naked childred were playing mudpies and not something more lasting (it's damned hard to get pregnant or infected with a colorful disease when there's mud and ... well, think "moo" ... being shoved into your orifices).

Nothing much of an intelligent nature was being said at Woodstock, either. Bill Graham notably remarked that one way to keep the gatecrashers out was to surround the place with a moat filled with burning oil. And I sat down under a soggy tent at the base of the hill where the helicopters were coming and going, carrying rock stars and reporters, and had a beer alongside Jerry Garcia. We had a typical 1969 conversation:

"Hey man."
"Hey man."

And we finished our beers in silence watching someone play. I don't remember who it was, and like so many of the rockers I knew at that period in history, Jerry's not here to jog my memory.

What shall we make of Woodstock? I hated it at first. It was wet and cold and smelly and there was nothing to eat save for warm beer and stale donuts; the portable toilets were overflowing and there was nowhere to relieve yourself except the woods. Now, I spent a good chunk of my childhood in the woods and by the stream, and am fearless about using nature as my toilet. However, it's not the sort of thing expected of New York Times writers, even werewolves.

With the press badge and parking permit below -- yes, I see that the Woodstock people screwed up and not only called me by the wrong byline, but misspelled it -- came certain responsibilities. One is to avoid pooping in front of half a million people.

Woodstock. At the time, I hated it. So did the editorial page people at The Times. Then they reversed course and opined about how wonderful the whole thing was. For three days in a cow pasture in slightly upstate New York, there was the equivalent of the third largest city in New York State and there were no murders, was no crime ... well, okay, I hear you ... nothing but peace, love, music, and a mud amalgam being ground into your assorted holes.

But about three days after the three days of peace, love, whatever were over, I realized that I had attended a certified event. There was a lot of good music, for those who got close enough to hear it, of course. My personal favorite was a nighttime set by the otherwise despicable Sly Stone and his "Family." I'll get around to him later, other than to say that Sly and the Family Stone's performance of "I Want to Take You Higher," with audience members throwing sparklers into the air, was absolutely sensational. Nobody said you have to be a decent human being to make great music.

There were other moments, to be sure. Blood, Sweat & Tears. The Band. Jefferson Airplane, sure. Richie Havens, a friend from the East Village, his festival-opening marathon set is rightly famous. Sha Na Na, fellow fixtures on the Columbia campus who did some early harmonizing in my living room on 113th Street next to the methadone clinic and the drug building, were good. Joan Baez, who I sat next to a year and a half before in the front row of the Yippie press conference at which Abbie Hoffman announced plans to demonstrate outside the 1968 Democratic National Convention. I didn't see Jimi, because as I recall I was off being huffed at by Janis while he was rewriting "The Star Spangled Banner." And there was the never-to-happen-again chance to have a conversation with Jerry.

Come to think of it, how did festival-goers get dry matches with which to light the sparklers? How did I lose anything resembling dry paper to write on and, thus, was forced to do some classic reportorial stunt writing. I ad libbed a "new top" --in that case, the first five paragraphs of an existing story. I wrote it in my head and dictated it over the phone line straight to the transcriber in Times Square, and it went into the paper without change. Said Dick Shepard, my editor and the paper's designated werewolf trainer, "that means you're a professional."

Thanks. Can the next gig be someplace dry?

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