People sometimes ask me if I was at Woodstock. Sadly, I have to admit I didn’t make it. Seems it was in upstate New York, and I was here in California, trying to get enough credits to graduate with the class of ’69. Also, sadly, I didn’t graduate until 1970. Must have been too much beer…and rock & roll.
I said I know it’s rock and roll, but I like it, I like it, yes, I do. Oh, well, I like it, I like it, I like it. (“It’s Only Rock and Roll” – The Rolling Stones -1974)
I did, however, make it to the 1970 “Christmas Happening” in a remote area of Laguna Canyon, probably the biggest thing to ever happen in the tranquil artist colony of Laguna Beach. It was three days of peace, love, free food and non-stop music.
The “Happening” began on Christmas Day, as 25,000 hippies descended on Sycamore Canyon, a dusty, brush-covered offshoot of Laguna Canyon. I arrived with some college chums – we called ourselves “The Motley Merry Men… should have been “The Motley Fools” – early on the second day of the three-day-affair, before the local constable closed all roads (both of them) leading into Laguna Beach. We parked our hippie van alongside Laguna Canyon Road and hiked about a mile along a dirt road leading to the festival site, where a crude stage had been erected.
We “Merry Men” set up camp on a brush-covered hillside, above the main festival site, where we laid out our sleeping bags, then enjoyed a concert by several mostly unknown bands. That evening, the somewhat known Buddy Miles Blues Band entertained us. The Grateful Dead, who were supposed to headline the event, were stopped dead in their tracks, as the local constable refused to allow their truck caravan into the festival site.
The only other large-scale music festival I attended back in the day was Cal Jam, held on April 6, 1974, at Ontario Motor Speedway (now Ontario Mills). The Jam featured Deep Purple, Emerson, Lake and Palmer, The Eagles, Black Sabbath, Black Oak Arkansas, Earth, Wind and Fire, Seals and Crofts and Rare Earth.
Attracting nearly 400,000 paying fans, it set records for the highest paid attendance and loudest amplification system ever installed. I didn’t remember much after that.
Like they say, “If you remember the 60s (and 70s), you didn’t live it.”
Next summer, I’ll tell you what I remember about 1967’s “Summer of Love.” In the meantime, I said I know it’s only rock and roll, but I like it, I like it, yes I do.
Keep it flyin,’
Uncle Mott
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