Woodstock 1999

A detailed Summary of Woodstock 1999

Woodstock 99: The Perfect Example of American Culture

With the draft for Viet Nam, political scandals, assassinations, and riots, the 1960's brought forth large amounts of fear and apprehension around the country. In 1969, in the midst of all this chaos, on Max Yasgur's farm Woodstock took place. At the Woodstock '69 celebration, the people experienced the happiness of feeling safe and cared for. For three heavenly days, a hurt generation could return to a haven of love, peace, music, sharing, and sanctuary. At the end of the festival of peace, love and music, everyone returned home, forever touched by the promise of Woodstock, each in their own way, each with their own memories. Those memories, shared with friends, lovers, and children for over thirty years, have become the inspiration and motivation to try to recreate the promise of Woodstock thirty years later. Although the original Woodstock was a sanctuary for peace and the enjoyment of music, Woodstock '99 was a perversion of the original because it was a totally commercialized, media driven event complete with highly inflated prices and excessive violence; therefore, the event became a perfect example of American culture today.

Just like our culture today, people can't go anywhere without seeing violence. Instead of a peace and love atmosphere, Woodstock was a violence filled environment. Everywhere one looked there was some sort of violence being displayed. There were the "Beer people" verses the "Mud people", each screaming and throwing things at one another over the fence. Up close to the stage of a concert, women were being groped and assaulted against their will with cheering, and supportive onlookers. Every band participated in displaying violence in one way or another. The Offspring's singer took a baseball bat and smashed the heads of the Backstreet Boys life size cardboard displays. Kid Rock with his little sidekick got the crowd to throw things onto the stage. Limp Bizkit threw bottles at the crowd, and crowd-surfed on an eight-foot bed of plywood during his song "Break Stuff", which encouraged fans to go tear down the one-hundred foot radio tower. The most traumatizing event that took place were the riots at the end of Woodstock. People sick of the heat, high prices, hunger, the stench, and garbage, started to tear up the place, ironically starting with the peace wall. Later, during the Red Hot Chili Peppers concert, the Chili Peppers sang the song "Fire", by Jimi Hendrix and many fires were set. The trailers which vendors used, each with a propane tank were ignited causing huge explosions and fires. The vendors, pay phones, and ATM machines were looted, cars were flipped over and ignited, and garbage was used as fuel for the bonfires. Angry, and self-destructive images from Woodstock '99 portrayed violent reenactments of what we see in today's every day life.

The media was a great disturbance to Woodstock '99. They lugged their cameras around sticking their noses were they should not be. As concertgoers were enjoying the music displayed by the bands, reporters charged in and started recording mosh pit

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Approximate Word count = 1296
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: Music