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Wednesday, Aug. 17, 2005 | ||
What do you think of this story? Bad Links? | Hair today, gone tomorrowTo a lot of people who werent there, the 60s are a giant embarrassment. They like to deride the attitudes and the behavior, and even the music of that period as if it was just a bad trip. I remember someone I used to work with telling me that she hated the 60s. She had a lot of hang-ups. Perhaps her biggest was the fact that she idolized Huey Lewis and The News. I rest my case. I was too young to go to Woodstock, but if I could have snuck out after lights out, I would have thumbed it there, even though I was only 12. I was already a big Beatles fan, a Stones fan, and a complete nut about The Who. I absorbed a lot of that decade myself through my grade school and junior high years. I cant help but feel when people put down what that time meant culturally, that its nothing more than sour grapes. Some people dont get it and they never will. Sure, theres been a lot of great music since then, but the 60s ushered in a string of performers on the rock stage that had first crack at breaking the barriers of rhythmic sound. Woodstock was the graduation party of that decade, and the line-up (much of which has been preserved on film and vinyl) for the three-day event is a testament to the raw power of that generations music. Maybe you dont agree with their lifestyles, since half of them died of overdoses, but the way they played and sang as if every note counted is impossible to deny. From the films opening performance by Richie Havens to the phenomenal concluding guitar workout by Jimi Hendrix, there is a palpable energy emanating from this unique cultural document. Every act seems to throw themselves completely into their songs. There is a long lost joy visible on stage. The boogie-crazed jams of Canned Heat, the inner journeys of Jefferson Airplane, and the polyrhythms of Santana bubble over with sheer sonic glee. The Who are captured forever at the height of their power. Alvin Lee and Ten Years After are also on hand for posterity and a killer blues jam. Janis Joplin sings her heart out, a woman who always gave 200 percent on stage. Yes, these were hard livin, hard rockin people. They didnt phone it in. Their music grabs you by the collar and screams in your face, Wake up! It seems that since the 60s faded away under a mountain of polyester and other synthetic material, that the world has been replaced by a race of somnambulists. My own personal theory is that technology has made us complacent, comfortable. Maybe CDs have some great innovations, but you had to get up out of your chair to turn over a record. You could see the music in the grooves, the soft parts and the loud parts. Now all you see is your own reflection in a piece of silver plastic. Luckily we have the ability to record events, thereby preserving not only visible and audible records of ourselves, but almost by accident, examples of what we used to be. It may seem silly to some that these longhaired hedonists say things like Groovy! and Far out! Mike Myers made a million bucks off of his own twisted version of that attitude. This is what always happens. The mainstream culture options the counter-culture. It gets hammered and stamped into a thousand shapes, sold like candy. Consumers eat it up because they are too lazy or too disinterested in their own time to look past the slick surface. I have another theory. People dont really need culture. They just need distraction. The more substance you give them, the less they will like it. For these people, life is a smooth ride down a freshly paved highway with the occasional drive-thru for a cheeseburger. Its a kind of lifestyle that separates one from the earth. These people should just get out and walk under the trees, across the fields. I know its a big step. Its kind of scary at first, to be without direction, without a map or even an I-pod. Yes, it was tough being a young hippie in a small town, but I walked everywhere then, even to the library. Even to school! I had my music waiting at home, but the songs were in my head all day. Woodstock was one heck of a concert, but even more than that its an attitude that you can take with you wherever you go. | |
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