Possibly the worst 4 days of my life...

Posted: Jan 10, 2010

Ok-some background: When I was 13 years old, I witnessed Woodstock '94 on pay-per-view and immediately almost became obsessed with the idea of Woodstock. In regards to the festival in '94, although it was not historic in comparison to the original concert in 1969, it was one hell of a concert and it defines the 90's generation-which by the way was a great time in music and popular culture. The mood seemed to be great at the festival and it had what I would consider career-defining performances by many bands including Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Primus, Cypress Hill, Greenday, Henry Rollins, Perry Farrell (Porno for Pyros) etc...and even the "old-timers" were great such as Bob Dylan and Crosby, Stills &Nash (these are performances I still watch occasionally to this day). In any case, when I heard that there was another Woodstock in July of 1999 (I was now 18), there was no doubt in my mind that I was in.

What I didn't take into consideration when I rounded up a few troops and paid for my ticket is how much the music scene had taken a turn for the worse since 1994. The lineup for the show had to be one of the worst lineups for a 3-day festival ever assembled (with a few exceptions such as RATM, Dave Matthews, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Metallica...and I think that was about it). Unlike 1994, most of the bands chosen were not timeless, important bands but rather bands that would predictably be only around for the quick two-year rap-metal fad then left to fade away. So before I ramble on too much, this is what I believe the major issues were with Woodstock '99 and why it failed:

1. The Performers: As I mentioned above, not only was the lineup musically unimportant and horrible but do you really expect people that listen(ed) to Limp Bizkit, Korn, Insane Clown Posse, and Kid Rock to be peaceful, educated, and sensible? This lineup doomed this festival from the start. Unintelligent bands=Unintelligent crowd.

2. The Site: When I think of Woodstock, I think of a beautiful green farm in the middle of nowhere, not a dreary, gray (most of the grounds were concrete), former air-force base with no trees. The site was chosen for security reasons by the promoters who were more concerned about gate-crashing than anything else. Griffiss Air Force Base was an awful place to be for 4 days.

3. Did I mention the concert was in the middle of July? (the other two Woodstocks were in mid-August): This kind of coincides with the site being the problem. The temperature soared well over 100 degrees bouncing off the concrete floor. I remember many miserable faces who had their shirts crumbled into a ball on their heads in an attempt to protect themselves from the blaring sun. Everyone was pretty much forced to buy many bottles of water at $4 a pop to literally survive.

So my memories of the event are this:

- The mostly moronic and rowdy crowd who constantly screamed at girls "Show your tits!" repeatedly and at one point a mob consisting of about 100 jackasses took it upon themselves to knock over about 50 barrels of garbage and beat on the barrels with 2 X 4s.

-Being completely drained and miserable from the extreme heat. There was hardly any shade to escape the sun and I had the worst sunburn of my life that left my skin pealing for about a month after I got home. I was so exhausted by Saturday night that I watched the legendary Rage Against the Machine play their set and was only thinking how I wanted to go home. Metallica was coming on next (and the Chemical Brothers who I really liked and wanted to see when I got the tickets) and I simply didn't care. I stumbled back to my tent and called it a night.

-My only positive memory was watching the Red Hot Chili Peppers close the show. They sounded great and for the first time over the 4 days, I was having fun. This was short-lived however as the Chili Peppers had to cut the set short due to the hostile crowd setting fires near the stage.

So in about 4 days, I probably enjoyed about 1 hour of it.

Share Your Woodstock Experience

Comments