Given my radical hippy past as a teenager (from 1968 to 1971), I have often written about what was perhaps the key defining moment of the entire counterculture: the Woodstock festival in upstate New York of August 1969. Many articles of mine looked at that epoch-making event, including the good, the bad, and the ugly.
But for some reason I never wrote about the 30-year follow-up concert held at a former air force base in Rome, New York in July of ‘99. Last night I watched a doco on it, and it made for grievous viewing. Anyone who lived through both concerts – even from afar – knows what a stark contrast was found between the two events. Three days of “peace and music” in 1969 were replaced by three days of debauchery, anger, rage and violence in 1999.
Sure, the original was not all sweetness and light, with plenty of drug overdoses, a lack of proper crowd control and security, poor logistics, not enough food and toilets, etc. But it seemed almost utopian compared to what occurred three decades later.
There was plenty of drug and alcohol abuse, far too many sexual assaults and even rapes (all fuelled by the constantly heard ‘show us your t**s’), and bands that often provoked the crowds into mayhem and anarchy. Unlike the mainly peaceful vibes of 1969, the weekend in Rome was characterised by bad vibes, anger, hostility, aggression and far too much anti-social behaviour.
That culminated in a raft of destructive acts, and some very dangerous fires that were set on the Sunday night. If there was idealism and optimism at the original, there was simply anarchy and out of control selfishness and hedonism at the second. There was no hope for a better world, just the desire for far too many to spin completely out of control in debauchery and hedonism.
Rolling Stone magazine said this about it:
Woodstock ’99 was supposed to celebrate the 30th anniversary of “peace, love and happiness.” Instead, the Rome, New York festival earned the infamous distinction of “the day the Nineties died.” There were tons of contributing factors that made the fest the anti-Woodstock: Organizers trying to wring every last dollar from festivalgoers from exorbitant ticket prices to costly water bottles, a festival site built atop hot tarmac in late-July heat, a poorly curated and scheduled lineup and an angry, aggressive crowd that left a charred festival site and sexual assaults in its wake.
As to the final day of rioting and sheer pandemonium:
This is where Woodstock ’99 devolved fully into Lord of the Flies. When the Red Hot Chili Peppers unleashed a cover of Jimi Hendrix’s “Fire” during their festival-closing set, it was meant as a tribute to the guitar hero’s legendary performance at the original 1969 fest. However, following a weekend of extreme heat, overpriced vendors and general bad vibes, “Fire” was the flint that ignited the crowd. We all know what happened next: Bonfires broke out throughout the crowd. Vehicles were flipped and set ablaze. Vendor booths and merch tents were destroyed and used as fuel. Eventually, the New York State Troopers and local law enforcement were able to diffuse the riots, but Griffiss Air Force Base still ended up looking like a bomb hit it. https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/19-worst-things-about-woodstock-99-176052/
Many commented on what was the difference between the two festivals. There was a rally cry for most at the first one: opposition to the Vietnam War and the like. Moreover, the counterculture was still in full bloom at the time and that contributed to a more unified vision of what this was all about.
None of that was there thirty years on, and when event organisers tried to recreate a bit of nostalgia, hardly anyone had a clue what was being referred to. Overwhelmingly these were bored, middle class whites in their early twenties who knew nothing about what had transpired before they were even born.
Internet porn was starting to make the rounds, MTV had taken off, shows like Girls Gone Wild were popular, the Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinski scandal had recently broke, concerns about Y2K had many spooked, and there was no clear rallying point for young people to get behind, nor any important unifying causes to champion.
It was mainly just a time of hedonism, me-firstism, and an increasingly secularised culture wherein concern for others and the common good was replaced by decadence and personal pleasure. No wonder the ‘99 festival was such a disaster. Older organisers trying to recreate the good vibes of earlier times were living in dreamland. Most folks there just wanted to get drunk, rock out, and give in to their hyper-sexualised passions.
If you simply take some parts of the shopping list of ungodliness and immorality as found in 2 Timothy 3:1-5, you will get a nice description of American culture at the time, and the sort of thing that was fully on display at the festival:
There will be terrible times in the last days: -people will be lovers of themselves -without love -without self-control -lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.
That pretty well summarises things at Woodstock ’99. But as I said repeatedly in my earlier pieces on the first festival, the idealism, optimism and utopianism of the people back then (myself included) was simply not sustainable. As I wrote in one article:
The intentions were good. But it was to be simply a house built on sand. We had no basis for making it a reality. We did not realise that ultimately it was not social structures that needed to be changed or overthrown (eg, capitalism, the military-industrial complex, etc.), but ourselves.
Sin and selfishness were the real problems, and the narcissism of the drug culture would only exacerbate the problems, not relieve them. We thought we knew what was not working, but we did not have a panacea to offer in its place. Therefore the peace and love revolution was very short-lived. https://billmuehlenberg.com/2009/08/17/reflections-on-woodstock-and-the-counter-culture/
And my biblical reference of course was to the saying of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount. In Matthew 7:24-27 we find these words about the need to ‘build your house on the rock’:
“Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”
I and millions of other idealistic young people back then really did want to see a better world. We rejected all the materialism and militarism and authoritarianism of our parents and thought we could bring a bit of heaven to earth. But we were greatly mistaken.
There can be no real peace and love without the Prince of Peace and without the source of genuine love. Trying to create a better world without the one who alone can help us do this is a fool’s errand. Only when Christ comes again will we fully see some of what us hippies were hoping for.
That is not to say there is no place for seeking to improve our lot on earth. Christians of all people have always been at the forefront of social reform, be it helping women and children, tackling slavery and oppression, establishing educational and medical facilities, and so on. And there have been non-Christians who have also made valuable contributions here.
But given our natural bent away from God and toward self, the youthful dreams of Woodstock ’69 could only of necessity just drift into the youthful anarchy, decadence and savagery of Woodstock ’99.
Afterword
One did not need to wait thirty years to see if things could get better – or worse. Within four months of Woodstock, there was another concert – a free one at Altamont, a raceway outside of San Francisco. But it ended up with a zealous fan being stabbed to death by Hells Angels who were acting as security guards. We all knew then that the hippy dream was dead and buried. See the article I linked to just above for more on that fateful concert.
I was 20 years old and during my summer break from college, lived less than 100 miles from Woodstock (grew up about 40 miles from Rome AFB). My old rebellious self wanted to go to Woodstock. Fortunately, I was already married to a woman with more common sense than I. And; we had a new baby. I had no desire to go to the remake in 1999. By then, God had my attention. That 30-year period is a clear illustration of the cultural decay that continues in the USA.
I was 20 years old and during my summer break from college, lived less than 100 miles from Woodstock (grew up about 40 miles from Rome AFB). My old rebellious self wanted to go to Woodstock. Fortunately, I was already married to a woman with more common sense than I. And; we had a new baby. I had no desire to go to the remake in 1999. By then, God had my attention. That 30-year period is a clear illustration of the cultural decay that continues in the USA.
Well done Francis.