DJTees Blog

In January 1972, Lieutenant Colonel Michael Underwood, a 33 year old colonel, going on 103, formerly of the Queen's own Cameron Highlanders and owner of a 47 and a half acre estate in the Kent village of Bishopsbourne announced it was to be the site for the Great Western Festival, to take place over the Whitsun Holiday weekend in May. The locals were severely dischuffed with this turn of events and set about being beastly to our Colonel in what sounds more like the opening of an Agatha Christie story. "A small minority have behaved with viciousness and in an...

The Aachen Open Air Pop Festival was a rock festival held at Hauptstadion in Aachen, Germany, on 10–12 July 1970. The Hauptstadion is located in the Sport Park Soers in Aachen. It was more usually used for equestrian and show jumping and had a capacity of 40,000. This was an early German rock festival and like many, it drew heavily on the emerging British progressive bands for its line-up of performers. The "Soersfestival", as it is commonly called, was the initiative of three local students: Golo Goldschmitt, Walter Reiff, and Karl-August Hohmann. The gig faced the usual problems trying to...

I first saw Jeff on the 'There And Back' tour at Newcastle City Hall. He was brilliant. But he was also absolutely unique. No-one else sounded like him, no-one played music the way he played it. At that time he was emerging from his jazz-fusion phase, a phase I loved. As someone who grew up listening to the Mahavishnu Orchestra, that kind of music was already part of my DNA and of course Jeff had recorded with Jan Hammer, a connection to Mahavishnu in itself.  When I first heard the Yardbirds playing 'Shapes Of Things' and 'Over Under Side Ways Down'...

 On Sunday, May 24, 1970, up to 40,000 long hairs, students and freaky deaks arrived at a muddy field at Michigan State University’s Old College Field for a one-day festival that was inevitably later dubbed ‘the mini Woodstock.’ The movie was now playing at local theaters, so everything was viewed through that lens.  The Open Air Celebration, held just three weeks after the Kent State killings which CSNY wrote Ohio about, was a break from weeks of student demos, fear of the draft and general political heaviosity. Classes were ostensibly over, despite no formal action by the administration. "Oh wow,...

This was the second Saugatuck Pop Festival and was held on July 4-5, 1969 in the same spot as the first the previous year, next to Potawatomi Beach, but because the ‘69 Festival was projected to be two or three times larger, the adjacent property owned by Pauline Nichols, was secured with last years Manifold property to accommodate the larger festival. It was an all-star lineup of Michigan bands, most of whom had only been in existence for 18 - 24 months at most. Big Mama Thornton (didn’t show), Brownsville Station, Früt of the Loom, John Lee Hooker, Muddy Waters,...

There is a genuine mystery about this festival. It’s another for the ‘it never happened’ file and in that, no so unusual. As we know, The Man was always trying to fend off the freaks with legislation, sometimes successfully, mostly not. But the Mid Winter Pop Festival doesn’t fall into that category.  Blythe is a wee town on the border between California and Arizona, right out in the desert. Basically head east from Palm Desert on the 10 and you end up there. I love that road, it’s so elemental and wild out there. You feel so tiny and transient...

The Toronto Rock and Roll Revival was held at Varsity Stadium, at the University of Toronto, to an audience of over 20,000. The originally listed performers for the festival were local band Whiskey Howl, Bo Diddley, Chicago, Junior Walker and the All Stars, Tony Joe White, Alice Cooper, Chuck Berry, Cat Mother and the All Night News Boys, Jerry Lee Lewis, Gene Vincent, Little Richard, Doug Kershaw and The Doors. Kim Fowley was listed as the Master of Ceremonies. Screaming Lord Sutch was later added to the bill, as was the Toronto area band Flapping. What sort of a name...

What interests me about this show is that, by any usual definition, it wasn’t a ‘festival.’ Rather, it was a regular gig. Three bands played Tim Buckley headlined, supported by Iron Butterfly, Blood Sweat And Tears. It was held indoors at the 3,000 capacity Cleveland Public Hall on April 18, 1969. Tickets $5.50 in advance $6.50 on the door. Now, the fact that it was christened a ‘festival’ shows, I think, how the word was becoming even in 1969 as a kind of dog whistle for rock fans, freaks and hippies. This would normally have just been ‘a concert’ but...

Sky River was unusual, if not unique, in that it was held for three consecutive years from 1968-70. 1970’s was held between Fri Aug 28, 1970 and Tue Sep 08, 1970 at the Edwin Tate ranch, Clark County, Lehr Road, Washougal, Washington. Yes it was 10 days long!  All Sky River fests were very hippie affairs and sound brilliant. With over 10,000 there each day and 40 bands performing across the 10 days, there were also a lot of alternative lifestyle events. At one point 15 couples got married on the stage and then, on the last day of the...

The second Sky RiverFestival was held on from Sat Aug 30, 1969 - Mon Sep 01, 1969 at Rainier Hereford Ranch, Tenino, Washington. The promoters said Sky River II was meant to “combat racism, hatred, violence, and poverty” which sounds cool. Did the locals want such altruism on the doorstep? What do you think?   For most of the month preceding the festival, it looked as if the event would never take place. Under intense pressure from a local leader of the John Birch Society, police, conservatives, and the Catholic Archdiocese, virtually every county in the area passed laws prohibiting or severely...

The Oval is a cricket ground in the heart of London and at first glance, not the most obvious place to hold gigs. Cricket needs a smooth and even pitch and sticking 35,000 hairies on top of it is hardly ideal. However through the early 70s, it was host to many excellent one-day festival gigs which attracted many big international acts as well as British bands. This show in mid-september, after the end of the cricket season, was a Bangladesh fundraiser and with The Faces and The Who at the top of the bill it was always going to pull...

Inverness, for those not familiar with Scotland, is the capital of the Highlands, a long way from most everywhere else. So putting a festival on there and getting a good roster of bands to play, can't have been easy. However in 1970, bands would tour the highway and byways of the UK more fearlessly than they do today. With Taste, Savoy Brown, Atomic Rooster, Brinsely Schwarz, If and Black Widow on the bill, it was a must go-to gig for all the local heads. Black Widow closed the show but was not allowed to 'sacrifice' a woman which was part...

The Day on the Green gigs were legendary. They took place in Oakland Coliseum across from San Francisco and were put on by Bill Graham of Fillmore fame. They ran from 1973 through to 1992, a year after Bill’s tragic early death in that 1991 helicopter crash, but their peak years were mid70s to early 80s when he would compile some truly amazing bills, often featuring local SF bands like Steve Miller, Sammy Hagar, Journey, 415 and many more.  Perhaps the peak years for people of our tastes were 1976-78. Look at these bills.  Day On The Green # 1...