WOODSTOCK 94

Back in 1994, I was presented an opportunity. I guy I knew who owned and operated a radio station, came into my video store one day and said, "Hey, do you and Meff want to go to Woodstock?" Keep in mind that this was about four days before the event was to take place. Thinking he was joking, I stammered, "Uh... sure." And then he explained.

He was given a contest giveaway by the promoters - who may have been Pepsi. I can't recall. Actually, it may have been something called "Media America." Whatever, it's not important. So anyway, he was told that the promoters had originally offered the giveaway to WAPL out of Appleton. But WAPL turned them down. The catch was that in exchange for the prize, they had to do a shitload of advertising for the promoters. So instead, they gave the contest to the guy I knew - who could care less about having to provide extra advertising.

So after listening to what he told me, I then said, "So... how am I supposed to win this contest?" His reply - "I'll rig it!"

It's nice to know people in high places, huh?

Well, the contest was for two people. There's no one else other than Meff who I would even consider for such an event. So I immediately called him. And he was onboard.

A day or two later, the guy literally did in fact have to rig the contest. I was the "lucky caller" who called in one night. And I stood right next to him as he announced on the air (around midnight) that I had won. It was a small radio station that probably didn't have any listeners that time of night. So he then called the promoters and gave our names and such. Two days later, I received a package by Fedex - two round-trip plane tickets, two tickets to the concert - and two VIP passes that allowed us to go anywhere on the concert site - with the exception of backstage. Cool!

So on Thursday night, I drove down to Meff's. Our plane left Milwaukee at some awful hour like 6:30 in the morning. So we had to be up by 4:00 or so. Meff's dad drove us to the airport. Needless to say, I got to Meff's around 11:30 at night. And between the excitement and showing him the tickets and stuff, we didn't even attempt to go to bed until after 1:00 AM. And then we couldn't sleep at all. We ended up staying up all night. Ugh.

Now, Meff says we flew Midwest. I think he may be mistaken though. My expereince with Midwest is that they have direct flights into Newark. Our flight had a layover in Cleveland - where I paid way too much for a subpar sandwich. But I digress. Neither of us could sleep on the plane. And Meff was in constant pain, as he had forgotten to take some sort of pill that keeps his ears from exploding at high altitudes.

Once we arrived in Newark, we found the promoters. Apparently there were two contest winners from every state. So there was a grand total of 200 people there. We overheard some stories about how other people had won their tickets. One station had a "gross" contest, where the winner had eaten some sort of worm sandwich. Another winner had to bob for apples in a vat of manure. In our case... we knew a guy who rigged the "contest." HEHE. No, we didn't tell them that though.

After sleeping for maybe three minutes on the floor, we were all huddled into two buses for the two-hour drive up to Saugerties, New York - about 10 miles away from where the original Woodstock had taken place 25 years earlier. We got a nice view of New York City, as we headed north up the the New Jersey turnpike.

We arrived at the site somewhere in the early to late afternoon. By this time, Meff and I were tired and miserable. We felt awful from the lack of sleep. We were shuttled off the bus and brought to a special roped-off area where there were 100 red tents lined up. Our tent area was actually about a mile's walk from the actual concert site. So we were away from the mass of humanity of 400,000 people! And the best part was, we had 24-hour security around our tent city. So we could come and go as we please, and not have to worry about our stuff. Woohoo!

We got wristbands. Then we sort of bummed around the area for a bit, before we crashed, grumpy, exhausted and tired, into our sleeping bags. People were talking all night - or so it seemed. And even though we were a mile away from the two stages, we could hear the bands playing. On Friday night, they had a series of local bands playing. We were delirious with overtiredness. Both of us regretted having done this. It literally seemed like hell. But you know what? The next morning, we woke up, and felt fine. It's amazing what 40 hours of no sleep will do to your mind and body.

We decided that it was time to eat. The concerts weren't scheduled to start until around noon. So we walked over to McDonald's. And then we got in line - the longest food line known to man! I shit you not, we waited two hours in line - for McDonald's food! They weren't selling fries. It was only burgers, fish and chicken. Plus, the manager had taken a large piece of construction paper and had covered up the entire neon menu. In its place, he wrote out the few items they were actually selling - and their "new" prices for those days. Needless to say, it was more than double what it should have been. Talk about taking advantage of a captive audience! I felt really sorry for the workers. They were overworked beyond belief.

Eventually we got our food, and found a spot in the parking lot where we could sit and eat. There was a great big wooden privacy fence behond McDonald's. And I kept noticing that people would disappear behind it - then come out on the other side. I was intrigued. I was thinking there was some sort of drug activity going on. So when I was finished eating, I took a look. I walked around some bushes, then damn near literally almost stepped on two girls - who were squatting and peeing. One of them calmly looked up at me and said, "We're here." Indeed they were. I turned around and walked away. When they came back out, I went back in, and peed myself. When in Saugerties...

We went back to our campsite and discovered there was a shuttle bus that would take us to the concert site. Cool! We hopped onboard. The shuttle was supposed to come every 20 minutes or so. But this was the one and only time we ever saw it. The second time we tried to take it, we stood in line for over a half hour. It never came. So from that point on, we always walked. It really wasn't that far anyway.

So we got off the bus onsite. And we were immediately hit with that familiar scent of marijuana hanging in the air. I hadn't smelled it in years. But there's no mistaking it. And after awhile, it felt like you could get buzzed from the secondhand smoke alone.

So there we were, walking around in a giant field. We sort of walked in the direction of the stages. We saw a variety of acts playing at one time or another. But we didn't really settle in and actually watch and enjoy them. But we made a point to try and see Crosby, Stills & Nash. They were playing on the north stage - the main stage for the "big" acts. And then we ventured into the sea of humanity. Little tents set up everywhere - people milling about - no real walking paths. We went in a little ways, then turned around and came back. The whole process took about 90 minutes. We didn't make it very far. But we did see just about the whole set. The crowd went nuts when they were singing their song "Woodstock" and got to the line "By the time we got to Woodstock, we were half a million strong..." Remember, this band played their first professional gig together at the first Woodstock back in 1969.

We ventured back out and sat down to relax on a hill near the south stage. And then the rains came. And it rained, and rained, and rained, and rained. We went back to our tent - for what good it did us. By the time we'd walked that mile, we were soaked. At some point that day, we ventured out once the rain stopped. We discovered that a woman at a nearby house had opened up a hot dog stand in her front yard. At $1.00 per hot dog, it was a much better deal than the McDonald's food. And the wait time was a normal minute or two - as opposed to two hours. From that moment forward, every meal we ate was hot dogs.

In another blog, Meff mentioned the port-a-potty situation. Yes, they had them. However, they apparently didn't have enough. Because they filled to the top by Saturday morning. This wasn't just the port-a-potties in our tent area. No, this was the situation with every port-a-potty in the entire concert area. I read a review of the festival a few weeks later. The review made mention of the place stinking. It did indeed. From that moment on, we simply used them for peeing - if they were used at all. And for the record, neither Meff nor I dropped a deuce the entire time we were there. We simply refused to let it happen. Thankfully, our bodies must have sensed the problematic situation. Because they fully cooperated.

We went back to the concert site that afternoon. And what had once been a nice green field, was now a gray sea of mud. There was no grass left anywhere. The place was a mess. We were immediately approached by a guy in a pickup truck. He was selling shirts and sweatshirts in a shop onsite. He said we could each pick out a free one, if we'd each be willing to carry a box up to his location. Meff and I said sure - as did four or five other people. It seemed easy at first. The boxes weren't that heavy. However, they were large and very awkward, making them extremely difficult to get a good hold of. After two minutes, we realized we were on the boxed equivalent of a death march. This guys's location was quite a ways away. And it may have taken us 15 minutes to get there. The summer heat was beating down on us - no doubt helped by the humidty of the post-rain. So when we finally got there, we were all dripping from sweat. I grabbed the most expensive sweatshirt he had. I earned it!

The mud was thick and gray. At one point, I sunk so far into it that my shoe came off. I had to carefully place my foot back into it, then squirm around to try and get it unstuck. What a weekend...

There was a schedule of performances. Bob Dylan was coming on at 5:00, as I recall. So we got down near the north stage to get ready. I noticed a special fenced-off area, just to the left of the stage. And the people going in there seemed to have the same VIP passes that we had. I said to Meff, "Let's try it." Meff was his usual hesitant self. But he simply got behind me and let me lead the way. And sure shit, that area was for us! We walked right in, and got a killer view of the stage. From that point on, this is where we always went. We found ourselves leaning on a chain-linked fence, getting a nice view of the shows.

Bob was in rare form that night. The usually slurry-voiced folk-singing God sang every lyric as clear as day - and in tune! The highlight was when he sang "Rainy Day Women No. 12 & 35." That song repeatedly features the lyric, "Everybody must get stoned." Now in all fairness, the song means that literally - getting stoned with rocks thrown at you. But I think it's fair to say that when Bob wrote it, he had a double meaning in mind. The audience latched onto that second meaning. And there was plenty of pot-smoking all around.

Each artist was to play roughly 90 minutes. Then the stage would be redone for 30 minutes to prepare for the next act. Nine Inch Nails (who Meff and I had no interest in) were to come on at 7:00, followed by Metallica at 9:00. Aerosmith was supposed to close the show on the north stage on Saturday night. They were scheduled to come on at 11:00. We both wanted to see them. So we left to get some hot dogs, and planned to be back by 11:00.

We headed out around 10:15, and got down to our special VIP area around 10:45. To our surprise, Metallica was still playing. In fact, we learned that their set had just started. I guess Nine Inch Nails must have gone long. So what the hell. I liked a couple of Metallica's songs. So we stayed. And I'm glad we did! Metallica was the highlight of the festival. Those guys fuckin' rocked! The audience was eating it up. They must have gotten a little rowdy too, as every five minutes, members of the "Peace Patrol" (the security) would carry someone out on a stretcher and take them backstage. We were on the other side of the fence, right next to the backstage entrance. So we saw every one of them. I think people just got a little over-moshed. No one looked seriously hurt.

For their last song, Metallica played a song entitled "So What." Neither of us had ever heard of it before. In fact, I've since learned that it wasn't available on any Metallica album in the U.S. at the time. But they performed it live quite often. For those of you unfamiliar with this little ditty, it features lyrics like, "I fucked a sheep. I fucked a goat. I rammed my cock right down its throat. So what!" It's a delightfully vile song. At one point, Meff turned to me and said, "I like this song!" I couldn't agree more! And thanks to the miracle of Youtube, here is the exact performance we saw from that very night. Watch it. It's only three minutes long. It's just fast, hard, rock and roll. And it is a catchy tune too. Tell me you don't enjoy it!



Metallica ended their performance after that song. Then it was time for Aerosmith. About 40 minutes later (about 1:15 in the morning) the boys from Boston came on. And just as they started singing, the rains came again - another downpour. At this point, Meff had had enough. He decided to go back to the tent. I chose to stay. I figured that by the time I walked a mile back, I'd be soaked anyway. So I might as well stay, get soaked, and watch the show. And stay I did. Aerosmith put on a great show as well. And this is where I got one of the most surreal moments of my life. During their encore, they finally played their classic "Dream On." As expected, every lighter in the place went up. And there I was, in the middle of a muddy New York field, at 3:30 in the morning. The sky was dark. There were hardly any lights. Yet the flames of those lighters cast a golden glow over 250,000 people, while the band played on. It was an absolutely incredible sight to see. No photogrpahs could have done it justice. You just had to be there. I'm glad I was.

After the show, I unwedged my feet from the muddy footprints I'd made. I then made it out to the park road, and back out of the site. I then wandered past a few houses on the main street, where I saw kids strewn about, just laying in people's yards, and in some case, laying on the side of the road, sleeping. Again, too surreal. I kept wondering about Meff, as this was the first time we'd been apart the whole time. But alas, he was safe and sound back in the tent. By now the rain had stopped. And I was remarkably dry by the time I went to bed.

On Sunday, I think we went back to the concert site just once. We'd basically had enough. And there were no big acts that we were really interested in. Peter Gabriel would have been nice. But again, we could hear him singing from our tents. So we stayed put. By 7:00 Sunday night, the festival was over, and people began the leaving process. Our bus didn't leave until Monday morning. So we had one more night. The next day, as we were packed and waiting for our bus, another guy pulled up in a truck and tried to sell us some T-shirts. They were probably bootlegs. But hell, they were something like two for $5.00. So I bought two.

I recall nothing about the bus ride back, nor the experience at the Newark Airport. But I do recall our layover in Cleveland. Believe it or not, we ran into two fellow concert-goers. And this couple actually had photographs they'd developed at some one-hour place. That was cool.

I must have been quite a sight when my parents picked me up at the airport. My once-colorful shoes were now dark brown. I hadn't showered, shaved (or shit) in three days. But I was alive. Incidentally, when I got home, I scraped off a bunch of the dried-up mud from my shoes, and put it in a bag. I still have that bag today - my souvenir - genuine Woodstock 94 mud.

I have some pictures from that weekend. They're up at my parents' home. One of these days, I'll retrieve them and post them here. Again, this was one of the most surreal experiences of my life. But would I do it again? Hell yes! (Well, at least back then I would.)