50th Anniversary of Altamont Free Festival 6/12/69

[New Dazzler]

For those of us of a certain age, it may come as a shock that the Altamont Festival took place 50 years ago today.  For those not so sure what happened, I have posted the Wiki link below.  In brief, it was meant to be the West Coast of America's answer to Woodstock, but it all went badly wrong, tragically 18 year old Meredith Hunter was killed by the Hells Angels during the performance of the Rolling Stones who were headlining. The Angels were hired to provide "security" and were paid $500 worth of beer to do this (a recipe for disaster).  Earlier in the festival they had beaten up Marty Balin, lead singer of Jefferson Airplane whilst Airplane were performing.  I know a few of us oldies remember this disastrous festival as it was mentioned on Marty's passing on the RIP thread of 2018, and there is some shocking You Tube footage of the event.

Symbolically it brought a violent end to the 60s, which had spawned the "Summer of Love", and various "Peace and Love" movements typified by John Lennon and Yoko Ono in this country, and the counter culture centred around California and San Francisco, culminating in the Woodstock Festival with its central anti-Vietnam War sentiments (those who saw Country Joe McDonald's performance of "I Feel Like I'm Fixing to Die Rag" would get the gist).  Altamont was basically sex and drugs and rock and roll all going wrong and out of control.  But it has an important place in rock history, and was heavily referenced in Don Maclean's "American Pie".  Not sure that the 50th Anniversary is cause for a celebration, but I always found the whole event (and the events leading up to the event) fascinating.  Hope the link works!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altamont_Free_Concert

 

[AshtonGreat]

Gimme Shelter is an excellent documentary on that tour, and has extensive footage of the Altamont concert. Sounds like a nightmare by all accounts!