The view from the Dust on August 30th and 31st 1969.
Recollections of festival attendees.
Eric Griffiths
I was a shy young lad from West Wales just starting an apprenticeship in Plymouth and this was my first festival and first trip to the island. Memories? Well, there I have a problem - I remember the journey there, and . . . . part of the journey back, but the bit in between is a bit of a haze to say the least!! This was due, I am sure, to what I smoked and drank and, of course, the lack of sleep (sic!). I was only 16 and a half and some of my favourite groups, household names these-days, were performing - Moody Blues, The Who, Julie Felix, Joe Cocker, Free - among others. Then, of course, there was Bob Dylan, I was so looking forward to seeing him.
From memory, a number of us, all around the same age, got a train from Plymouth to Lymington (I believe) on the Thursday and then a ferry to the island - and that's where it gets hazy!!! We were new friends and looking forward to what was a totally new experience for us all. I know that I carried a few spare clothes and a sleeping bag and that we shared an improvised tent of sorts - more like a big plastic bag!! We walked and hitchhiked to the site; the tickets were just under half a week's wages at the time, but worth it to see the line-up and remember, this was my first time away. Spent all the weekend on site, eating, drinking & smoking what was available. I remember being wet at some time over the weekend, so either I ended up in a ditch or it must have rained!!! I remember a huge canvas dancehall of sorts and overall, the event seemed to be quite well organised. The music? Well, a lot of it went in one ear and out the other I'm afraid, but I do remember bits of the Who and Moody Blues. Dylan? Must have been "asleep" at the time!!!!
The trip back was uneventful except for arriving back at Plymouth station, dirty and tired and thinking I was one of the "flower people"! That lasted a day until I was able to remove all the grime in a hot bath and catch up on some quality sleep; then it was time to get back to work. Ah, happy days!!!!!!
Paul Roberts
My mate and I had finished 6th form and were 18 - waiting to start Uni at Reading and York respectively. The line up looked too good to miss – so many of our favourite bands in 3 days for a few quid. We left our home town in the Midlands on Thursday morning to hitch to Portsmouth. Slow progress meant we had to split up, but met up again in Pompey – we were pretty lucky because the cool people I was riding with were happy to pick up Steve (who was walking the last couple of miles) when we passed him. They took us to a pub near the ferry where a guy in flying jacket offered us acid. We stuck to pints.
Late ferry to the IoW and a bus ride to the site – all very well organised. But then a problem. We had been told there would be marquees to sleep in and sure enough there were. But they were full already – the day before the festival started. So there we were, no tent and a weekend of sleeping in the open to look forward to. Luckily in the 4 nights we were there I think it may have only rained a little on one night. This was late August and things could have been so much worse.
The first afternoon session in the arena began (as someone else has pointed out) with a band called Marsupialami. Never heard of before or since. No idea why I even remember the name, but the whole event was so mind blowingly good that the opening is still vivid in the memory. Each day’s gig began with an instrumental version of Amazing Grace at full volume on the huge WEMS PA (I’d never seen or heard anything like it) and I can still hear it now. Then Ricky Farr coming on – obviously well up for it but even to a naïve 18 year old seeming a bit too 'Woodstock' for an English audience.
Only a few thousand people were there for the first day and we were pretty near the front. By the Friday there were many more and we were further back but still in a good position. By the Sunday Dylan was a dot in the distance. Highlights of the music for me – The Nice (may have headlined Thursday?) The Who (on Saturday afternoon and absolutely brilliant;) the Bonzos; Julie Felix trying to be Joan Baez but eventually giving up and responding to crowd demands for Going to the Zoo. Too many to mention but just looking at the line up after all these years brings it all back.. Dylan – he was a let down, but by then it had all be too awesome to be a problem.
Other memories – Going swimming in the bay nearby one morning – mainly for a wash. The crowd - so varied, from youngsters like us, hippies by the thousand, a couple of mad older guys from London (looked and sounded like builders) who sat near us getting totally pissed who wandered off separately into the crowd in the dark. Pretty cold on the Saturday evening session – glad we’d kept a couple of bottles of wine to warm us up. Someone calling out 'Wally' in a very loud voice after every song to attract someone they’d lost – eventually most of the crowd were joining in.
I also recall wandering through my home town on the Monday afternoon on the way home. There was some sort of minor carnival on which, after the IoW experience, looked so flat and boring. Life for me had changed and moved on a lot in just 3 days. One footnote. On a recent break on the IoW I found a strange little shop in the middle of West Cowes that has all sorts on rock memorabilia – including a 1969 ticket with the line up listed. I’d completely forgotten that Indo Jazz Fusions. What were they all about? I must have been asleep.
David Kohn
Aug 69 I was barely 20 yrs old and had been wandering around the the UK, Paris, and finally Amsterdam for a month after a less-than-wonderful experience working on a kibbutz earlier in the summer. It was toward the end of Aug and I had to get back to London to catch my charter flight back to Chicago the first week in Sept. No sooner had I gotten back to London than I began to see all sorts of notices about the IOW festival in Ryde. I got on a train and headed down there. One of the people in my compartment was a reporter for the Montreal Gazette, and he suggested that he would get me press credentials as his photographer. We got off the train, got on the ferry, and headed straight to the place Dylan was to be having his press conference (where he didn't say much of anything).
After it was over one of the other people in the press room offered to let me crash for the evening in his hotel. In the middle of the night I'm awakened by this guy making some sort of pass at me. I'm a naive kid from the suburbs, so this kind of stuff I was only vaguely aware of by rumor. I just got out of there fast and headed over to the concert area where I met up with some kids from Scotland who were building a little shelter out of hay bales and tarps. I helped them finish and we had a nice comfortable house.
The first morning of the concert things were fairly sane in the little press section in front. I think we had two or 3 rows of seat and some space between the seats and the stage for taking photos or sitting on the ground. I was wearing my press pass in a full top hat I'd picked up at the Amsterdam flea market. I remember some celebrities up there in the press section -- Jane Fonda with Roger Vadim a few seats down from me. Keith Richards further on.
Into the afternoon the press section got ever more crowded. Evidently quite a few people (like me) who were not formally members of the press had managed to get passes. The event managers then decided to stop honoring our passes and reissue new ones on a much more selective basis. It looked like I was going to be shit out of luck until I saw Dylan's manager Albert Grossman standing off to the side. He happened to be the brother of one of my mom's best friends, so I walked over to him, introduced myself, and mentioned that I had spent some time with his nephew in the East Village just before I'd left New York a few months back. Although he didn't seem all that interested in the family small talk, he was gracious enough to make sure I got one of the reissued press passes.
For the most part the concert was kind of a blur. My clearest memory is looking up at Marsha Hunt's thick legs which were hanging out of her black leather shorts. The Band was great, Dylan less so. Other high points were the Who, Joe Cocker, and Bonzo Dog Band. As the concert ended I recall walking back to Ryde, but I have no recollection of the return ferry or train. A day or two later I was at Gatwick and on my way back my junior year of college.
Mike Thornley
I hitch-hiked to the festival with three 17 year-old friends, arriving in the field on the Wednesday. We found space in one of the dormitory tents and unrolled our sleeping bags before we set off to explore the area. When we got back, at about 7 pm, we found that this was also the disco tent with John Peel playing records and showing a "light show". The light show was a projector with a small glass ring filled with different coloured oils rotating in front of the lens. To us it was magical. Our sleeping bags had been neatly rolled up to make room for the music fans but our stake was made and no-one tried to poach it.
We had tickets for the three days and used them, almost going without sleep for a week. We lived off fish and chips, burgers and music. I remember Jethro Tull, Dylan (of course), the Who, and all the others who just took it in turns to thrill us. I also remember the naked girl, who happened to be right next to us. It was no big deal, everything seemed so natural.
At the end of the festival we made our way down to Ryde and spent the night in the doorway of a chemist shop. The chemist woke us up in the morning without any compaint, he needed to sweep the doorway before opening for the day.
David Ian Robbins
I lived as an army brat, all over the world until 1969 when we retired. I had a sense of restlessness that was part of my genes by that time and a strong energy for Bob Dylan. I left work in Wiltshire early that Friday Aug 29, and made it to the Festival along with a number of people who were fellow Fest-goers who I had met on the ferry. I was 16 then. I lay down on my sleeping bag in campsite 1 and listened to The Nice etc through the night. Saturday was cold but surreal. All the bands had an impact. The Moody Blues were great but a little too perfect. I met up with some homeboys, though that wasn't a current phrase then. We got stoned together and shared a campfire later.
Sunday was warm and later in the day there were hundreds , as I remember, of square feet of foam pumped onto an area of grass. I waded around blissfully and of course got soaked so stripped down to skin and laid my clothes on the ground to dry, there were many of us naked or nearly so but we were generally ignored. A photo showed up on the front page of the Daily Express of a couple of bare bodies but too distant to see if one of them was me.
I wished for more from Bob but was happy and made my way to Ryde to sleep in the parking lot of the ferry building until the first Monday morning boat took us back to the mainland. The trip over the Solent was more than just physical. I felt like I was leaving a place where for maybe the first time I'm my life I was home. Walking from the bus stop to our house in the Army camp of Tidworth, where we still lived during the last army year, I felt very transformed from two days before when I had left walking in the opposite direction.
I went to the following festival in 1970, a different me and another story. For 28 years now I have lived in Sonoma California and it was so long ago but still an energy that comes back to me when I relive that weekend in '69.
Lawson
I remember being at the Isle of Wight in 1969 about half way back and centre in the arena. I got chatting to a girl about my age, 18 at the time, and we talked about this, that and music. Slowly she began to drape herself over me, which was nice, but then the Band came on and I can still remember thinking, "I wish this woman would bugger off before Dylan comes on" Well, I was a young Welshman from the valleys travelling further from home than I ever had up to that point and I really needed to hear Dylan without interruption! As the Band set ended she explained that she was the daughter of a hotelier on the IOW and a few of the bands were staying at her dad's hotel, hence her freebie ticket ! She was hoping to interview some of the musicians at the hotel in order to try and break into journalism and, not being a Dylan fan was going back and did I want to come? I was now torn between going off with her and missing Bob or staying for Bob and missing out on a bit of an adventure.Bob won and his set was mediocre (but it was still this Welsh boy's first festival and I wanted to savour each bob moment !!!). I am happy to say that I never really regretted staying!
Mike
was walking along a lane and met this guy with a big hat. He said, "Do you want a job" So I was on stage crew. Under the stage when the Band practices. The only two people in the arena. Saw Tom Paxton stuffing money into his jerkin Told to keep people away from climbing over the picket fence Tried to stop a big bloke from coming in No Room - Al Grossman! as there was no room and then saw who was behind him. God How embarrassing Stepped on Pattie Boydes??? hat by mistake and got a dirty look. Ringo Starr was sitting in front of me. Used the money to make a record and went travelling ended up as a radio producer
frank devlin
Hi went to i.o.w.69. i went with 2 pals of mine, we were all 18 years old from dublin.our trip began dublin to holyhead by boat, holyhead to euston by train,euston to waterloo,waterloo to portsmouth,and then ferry to i.o.w.some journey .
We arrived on the island around 11pm and pitched tent along with thousands of other kids.i remember the tickets cost a fiver for the weekend.my pals were into a lot of the bands that were playing ,but i had come to see dylan.i remember the weather was great.unlike woodstock.
On the sunday morning hundreds of us went to the beach which was over the hill ,everybody went in naked which was very daring for 3 innocent irish lads. the compere of the show was a fella called richie farr,who all weekend said that the beatles were in the crowd ,and maybe they would play with dylan at the end. dylan was supposed to come on stage at 8 pm sunday to close the festival .he came on at 11 - 3 hours late . he played for 40 minutes and was gone . the crowd assumed he was taking a break,but he never came back.the crowd went nuts,and breaking up the fence around the site.
myself and my pals decided to try and reach the stage,which we eventually did by crawling under the canvas.we found richie still on the stage and had an argument with about how let down we felt with dylan and all all the bullshit from farr himself all weekend.he asked us where we were from and counted out 15 quid which he gave us to cover our outlay for the weekend and told us to go into the tent backstage and have a drink. the only person we recognised was jack bruce from cream.
The next day the site was like a bomb had hit it. we were asked if we would help clear it for a few bob,and we were not in any hurry we helped clear up.apart from dylan the gig was brilliant and we met loads of great people.we returned in 1970 to see hendrix in what would be his last gig.thats my story of a great time in my life.
Isle of Wight 1969
Unfortunately I didn’t get to see Bob Dylan play. Neither did my friends who were trying to live the 60’s dream, but without the "bread" man. Lemmy did the deals, Tony had the wheels and I was born to follow. I can’t remember anything in any detail, but there were some snapshots that I have kept in my head to this day.
The car, which was a clapped out Standard 10 filled with hippies, sleeping bags, camping equipment and a two sleeper tent, went downhill at over 70 mph and uphill at barely more than walking pace. But it made it to the ferry and we bought a ticket to Ryde , and had to sing the song, of course! On the ferry was a groovy white car painted over in pop art fashion with pictures, symbols and on the front it said "Dylan or Bust". I really hope they made it to see Bob.
I like to think my first single was "Like a Rolling Stone", though in all probability it was probably something embarrassing to admit to today. I played it endlessly on my radiogram trying to write down the words and reckoned I’d cracked it and recited it to anyone who would listen. Many years later a kind friend let me know, between fits of laughter, that "Once upon a time you dressed so fine, you did the monkey time in your prime .." wasn’t what Dylan wrote. For decades I thought she was a great dancer and the "monkey time" was some hip dance.
I listen to Dylan more now than I did then. For us, the big attraction was The Who. Although we were freaks (we preferred to be called heads), it wasn’t that far back when we were Mods. The movement from Mod culture to Love & Peace was accompanied by our change from speed and mandies and alcohol to cannabis and acid. At the I.o.W we couldn’t get any "shit" ... but we did have a supply of black bombers! During this time I worked in a dairy and lived in "digs" with a milkman called Geoff and his overweight wife Anne. In her medicine cupboard there was a large bottle of amphetamines prescribed by her doctor to make her more lively, less hungry and lose weight. Lemmy emptied the capsules into a handkerchief, replaced the contents with flour and put the bottle back. We huddled over the opened hankie in a marquee, provided free for those who didn’t have a tent, licked our fingers and dipped into the pile of powder until it was all gone.
Another image remains of a beautiful young hippy chick smiling and gliding by with "FUCK ME" written across her forehead. I had read about "free love" but this shocked me.
Next problem was to get in without a ticket, or the means to buy one. We walked round the whole perimeter looking for a way in for free. Lemmy collected some cash and gave it to a "guard" who turned a blind eye while we went under the fence. I can’t honestly remember much about the Saturday evening or even any of the songs, but I do remember seeing the finale of the set by the Who and Roger Daltry in his iconic fringed, brown suede jacket. Later on things started to turn really weird. The high from the speed wore off and we started experiencing anxiety and paranoia as we came down to the ground.
Later we found ourselves wandering aimlessly outside the fence between huge generator trucks that I’d seen before at fairgrounds. The thrum of the throbbing trucks mixed with the music fading and gaining in the wind was punctuated by announcements to the effect that there was some "bad acid" out there man, and if you were having a bad trip then go to the medical tent. BAD TRIP, BAD TRIP ! The effect of this magnified our paranoia, and probably thousands of others too. The last thing anyone wanted to hear was "bad trip". It took an eternity to get our heads straight and then the announcements started again. I wonder how many peaceniks had their serenity broken and their trip spoiled by this idiot. I imagine the medical tent filling up with freaked out heads and this spurring him to believe there was even more bad acid than first imagined and further cranking up their nightmare. We couldn’t find the medical tent. We were lost and remained so.
