If so feel free to share your stories about being there and what happened/what you did. That is of course if you are old enough to remember being there.
Peace.
I think that todays scene is a good opportunity for me to take my shirt off.
Bump. I was going to ask this too.
Meow.
I just love kitties!
Your question, the way it was worded, made me think that you meant- has anyone even been TO Woodstock...meaning the TOWN of Woodstock, as apposed to the ACTUAL event IN Bethel (White Lake) NY.
My answer: Yes, I've been to the town. NO, not the 1969 concert.
Why would somebody ask if anybody has been to the town? It's clear they meant the music festival.
Do you wanna wait & hear me describe death?
Do you wanna see if my spirit can use a phone?
"Why would somebody ask if anybody has been to the town? It's clear they meant the music festival."
No, it's not at all clear.
ClearER would have been, "Did anyone here actually go to Woodstock?" or "Did anyone here go to the festival".
Since so many confuse the town and the event, the question has to be asked.
It's pretty darn clear. Unless you're retarded. Or high.
share[deleted]
Well, the joke has always been, "Anybody who claims to remember being at The Woodstock Festival wasn't actually there." The same joke is often used to describe the 1960s in general. Or ANY really good party, for thay matter. Anyway, while there were hundreds of thousands of people who ACTUALLY did attend the festival (or who were in Bethel at the time), sadly, and for various reasons, there are also countless numbers of people who only CLAIM they were there. To those people I say, "There's no shame in being a young adult in the Summer of 1969 and NOT having gone to Woodstock!" My parents were in Germany at the time where my father was stationed with the Army.
Anyway, to those who REALLY know and EXPERIENCED the 60s, the best year to have been "involved" was 1966, and this despite 1967 always being called "The Summer of Love". By 1967, the whole 60s "thing" had already started to become commercialized and diluted by popular culture in general. Being a "hippie" by the time Woodstock came along was no longer the radical choice it had been a few years earlier. It is amazing to think, though, how quickly things changed between the arrival of the "mop top"-era Beatles in the U.S. in 1964 to then having thousands of dudes with hair down to their asses in 1969. Not that the 1960s were all about hair, of course...though one could think otherwise given how that time is often portrayed.
I am too young to have been to Woodstock, but I have two relatives that got engaged at the festival. Happy to say it's part of our family lore!
shareTried like hell to get there but once the Thruway (and other surrounding routes) shut down, it was all over for many of us. I've visited the town of Woodstock also - just for the hell of it, a few years later.
One thing I can tell ya that they got wrong in this movie was the hair styles. The 'shag' haircut didn't come into being until a few years later. Also, I don't recall ANYONE enjoying sex while trippin'. It made you feel grimy and anything but 'sexy'. I'm
not gonna say that no one did because I do know there were folks who did enjoy it while tripping but I only read about these west coast / San Fran types who did (claimed they did). Anyone/everyone I knew, to a person, told me that the last thing they felt like doing while trippin' was having sex. Now pot was a whole different story !!
Anyhow, I did miss Woodstock but attended just about every big outdoor concert on the east coast from that weekend forward. The most outrageous time I ever had at one was the Poconos Raceway concert a few years after Woodstock. It, like Woodstock, had rain, bad acid, great bands, no food etc etc. I didn't go prepared - just jumped into a car on the spur of the moment and went with the guys/gals who had tickets and crashed the gates (although they let people in for free once the fence went down).
Basically, they were a weekend of camping with the best sound system you could ask for.
People didn't like to hassle/cause hassles - it wasn't cool - fighting wasn't cool.
You were unwelcome if you had that kind of attitude. There were some big guys to escort you the hell out too but they would be shunned also if they got too rough. "Mellow" was the idea. Relax, get high, chill and enjoy the music - low stress. No head bangin', stage diving etc.
I'm trying to think of what would be a different 'experience' than the average concert and the only thing I can really think of is the smell of camp fires burning while you're listening to some of the biggest names in rock/folk and what could be called the 'suffocating' feeling, if you have anxiety issues etc - you look around you, realize you are going nowhere because you are surrounded by people for as far as the eye can see. I don't/didn't suffer from confinement issues whatever, but I knew people who did and it was a bit overwhelming for them. I've gone days without eating or using a bathroom because of where I was 'situated' and the packed like sardines environment.
After the first day, you barely noticed any of it - it becomes 'grin and bare it'.
There came a point where I decided not to ever put myself in these 'situations' ever again. Sitting in mud, getting soaked with no change of clothes, no bathroom or food close by ... one starts to feel a bit 'used and abused' rather than 'becoming one' etc.
I think Woodstock was kind of an anomaly many tried to replicate but it never quite matched that once in a life time experience. Altamont was 180.
I would take those days any day over these days though !! I don't know WTF kids are thnkin' these days.