Overview
Objectives
- Recall the significance of three outdoor music festivals: the 1967 Monterey International Pop Festival, the 1969 Woodstock Music and Art Fair, and the Altamont Speedway Free Festival, also held in 1969
- Examine how these three events capture the best and worst aspects of the music and culture of the late 1960s
- Recognize these three festivals both as musical events as well as cultural events in order to understand why they were so significant for both rock music as well as for the culture in general
The Altamont Speedway Free Festival
Altamont was only four months after Woodstock, but it seemed like a completely different world. Like Woodstock, it was a free outdoor concert with too many people, too few supplies, not enough space, and far too much traffic. Unlike Woodstock, the concert did not go on peacefully. In fact, it ended in tragedy.
The Rolling Stones had planned for Altamont to be the climax of their 1969 American tour. The concert was held in December of 1969 just outside of San Francisco. The concert was originally slated to be held at the Sears Point Raceway, but negotiations fell apart and the Altamont Speedway became the backup location. The space was far too small for the staging and the number of attendees.
Further, the Rolling Stones had hired the San Francisco chapter of the Hell’s Angels motorcycle gang to do security. Supposedly, they were paid five hundred dollars of beer for their security services. The members of the Hell’s Angels quickly got out of control, beating fans if they came too close to the stage. At one point, they knocked Marty Balin of Jefferson Airplane unconscious. While the Rolling Stones were playing onstage, the gang members beat an African American teenager to death in front of them. The Hell’s Angels’ murder of this young man at the Altamont Festival is often considered the end point of the countercultural movement. To many critics, this tragedy was a long time coming. Opponents of the countercultural movement believed that these poorly organized events that were crowded with people in altered states could not survive on goodwill and "flower power" alone, and the tragedy at Altamont only seemed to prove their suspicions.
"Around 100,000 flower blossoms were flown into Monterey for the festival from Hawaii, and were handed out to guests at the entrances to the grounds, as the Chronicle reported on June 17, 1967."
