DJTees Blog — Rock Festivals

An important festival as the UK got its groove on. Held between August 9-11th, 1968. After the disaster at Windsor in 1967, the festival moved in 1968 to Kempton Park Racecourse in Surrey.  It didn’t always go smoothly. Arthur Brown set his hair on fire, playing ‘Fire’ as you would imagine. He did this a lot, so it didn’t perturb the crowd unduly.  Then there was the little fact that a walkway collapsed under the weight of those sitting on it.  This actually injured 74 people, some of whom had to be taken to hospital.  But these were minor concerns...

Held on Parliament Hill Fields, Hampstead Heath, London initially in 1968, where Jefferson Airplane and Fairport Convention played in the rain. But in 1969 with the promoters a bit more worldwise booked three days of shows across 3 weeks in May and invited some heavy hitters of the emerging British psychedelic Head scene.  9th May Pink Floyd, Roy Harper, The Pretty Things, Pete Brown's Battered Ornaments & Jody Grind. 18th May Procol Harum, Soft Machine, Third Ear Band , Yes & Blossom Toes. 30th May Fleetwood Mac. Taste, Edgar Broughton, Duster Bennett. “At the all nighters refreshments will be available...

With so many students making up much of the regular festival crowds, it was inevitable that college’s would seek to put on their own gigs too, organised by students. Of course, many college principals were against the kids getting their groove on and this led to stand-offs between student entertainment committees and the squares. Inevitably though, there were always some staff who felt the kids should be allowed to celebrate their new and groovy culture and thus one way or another, a show was put on. The fear of a massive drugs freak-out and that there’d be people getting it...

Famously, this was a festival that never was. Due to be held Sat Aug 08, 1970 - Sun Aug 09, 1970 in the Arbuckle Mountains, Davis Oklahoma. The promoters had put together a strong two day line-up. Interestingly you couldn’t buy a ticket for one day, you had to buy it for both days for $12.50. Bands booked: Aphro-dity, Bloodrock, Courtship, Heavy Sugar, Isrofel. lIZE, Judd Mason, Proffit, Pacific Gas & Electric, Soul Purpose, Sugar Loaf, Sweet Smoke, The Byrds, The Flying Burrito Brothers, Zephyr With 30,000 tickets sales, it was looking like a good time was due to be...

This festival was a 3-day event held on  Fri Jul 04, 1969 - Sun Jul 06, 1969 on private land at Bullfrog Lake Trailer Park about 20 miles south of Portland, Oregon. The bands that played were headlined by Jefferson Airplane but also included Ace of Cups, Family Tree, Jimmy Holden Trio, Jugerknot, Mixed Blood, Portland Electric Zoo Band, The Sons of Champlin. Unusually for a 3-day festival, held a month before Woodstock, which must have had a lot of publicity locally, and is likely to have been subjected to the usual injunctions and uptight local townsfolk, very little has...

The Southwest '70 Peace Festival, was developed by musician Robert Gamble (aka P. J. Belly) and others and was a festival that ran March 26-28, 1970, on the Floyd L. Reynolds farm near Woodrow, Texas, in Lubbock County.  It had been originally permitted for a site near Dickens, but the festival was blocked three days before its opening by an injunction of district court judge Pat Moore. Boo! Stop harshing our buzz, Pat!  This sudden change of venue meant, in essence, the new site wasn’t really ready when people started turning up. There were power outages throughout the festival and...

Mariposa Folk Festival is a Canadian music festival founded in 1961 in Orillia, Ontario. Ruth Jones, her husband Dr. Crawford Jones, brother David Major and Pete McGarvey organized the first Mariposa Folk Festival in August 1961.  It was held in Orillia for three years before being banned because of disturbances by festival-goers. I wonder how rowdy those folkies really were? I can’t imagine a bunch of weird beards kicking ass, can you? The inaugural event, covered by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, featured all Canadian performers. The festival grew in popularity, size and rowdiness until the popularity of the 1963 festival...

This festival was held at Toronto's Varsity Stadium from noon to midnight on June 21 and 22, 1969 and is not to be confused with the show later in the year where John Lennon's ‘Live Peace In Toronto” was recorded, though that was put on by the same people. This was, in effect, a dry run for that show. Tickets were $6 a day or $10 for both days. At the time Toronto was very much in the throes of the emerging flower children hippie culture which probably explains why there were ads for the festival which offered to exchange...

Held between December 28–30, 1968 in Gulfstream Park, Hallandale, Florida, this was the east coast's first big fest. A gathering of the east coast tribes like none before it. It must've been so exciting. All the heads that had grown into the counterculture in the previous 2 years, plus even more weekend hippies wanting to get it on, made their way there to see a stellar line-up The Amboy Dukes, Chuck Berry, Blues Image, The Box Tops, Paul Butterfield Blues Band, Canned Heat, Wayne Cochran, Cosmic Drum (aka Train of Thought) James Cotton Blues Band, Country Joe and the Fish,...

This was held at the long-gone Almeda Speedway on Sun Jul 19, 1970 in Houston, Texas and is a significant moment in the nascent Texas rock culture.  The line-up was Albert King, Alive and Kicking, Flash Cadillac, Leon Russell, Mott the Hoople, Rare Earth, ZZ Top, Zephyr, Ginger Valley, Buttermilk Bottom, The Continental Kids, Pacific Gas & Electric, Children It was put together by Jim Tucker who was a thirtysomething Houstonian with a growing law practice but with a failed nightclub called, weirdly, Poverty's Project. But it had given him access to Houston music insiders. Along with a group of...

The Piper Rock Festival was originally scheduled at Peace Park in Akron, Ohio. Tickets went on sale and after over 10,000 were sold, the City Of Akron got a restraining order against the promoters of the show. This was a classic move by county hall to try and stop freaks getting their not inconsiderable freak on. It happened time and again, but the savvy promoters were often one step ahead of the game, and had already scouted out an alternative location as a back up. So the promoters of the show went on a search to find a suitable location...

The Trans-Continental Pop Festival (better known as the Festival Express) set off on a warm summer’s day in 1970. The now legendary tour was unique in that rather than flying to each city, most of the acts travelled on a chartered train. Back then it was considered old school and quaint, today, we’d more rightfully call it green. The Grateful Dead, Janis Joplin (with her Full-Tilt Boogie Band), The Band, Delaney & Bonnie and Friends, The Flying Burrito Brothers and Buddy Guy Blues Band all jammed, drank, slept and rode the train in between playing shows in Toronto, Winnipeg, Saskatoon...

Held on Sat Jul 18, 1970, at Soldier Field, Chicago this was a one-day festival organised by the radio station WCFL which was, at the time, one of area's big rock stations but had an interesting past. WCFL was the nation's first and longest-surviving labour radio station. Created by the Chicago Federation of Labor in 1926, it initially was listener-supported. During its first decade it offered entertainment, labour, and public affairs programming designed to serve the labour movement and working-class communities. Sounds cool.  By the 1940s WCFL had become more commercially oriented. It featured sports in the 1950s and '60s and,...

Held on Saturday June 13th, 1970 at Atlanta Stadium, Atlanta, Georgia, home of the Atlanta Braves, with a promising line-up of Albert King, Frank Zappa, Grand Funk Railroad Ike & Tina Turner, It's a Beautiful Day, Sweetwater, Ten Years After, The Allman Brothers Band and Traffic, plus local bands. As it turned out Ike & Tina Turner, Sweetwater, Albert King, Love and Ten Years After did not play. Now, this was a big stadium holding over 50,000 with the band playing on the field and fans sitting in the stands. However, such a big gap between musicians and audience is...