BlitzBlog

If you haven't heard, they've paved Paradise and put up a parking lot. Interestingly, Paradise in this case, is the site of the 1969 music festival known as Woodstock, in Bethel, New York.

A gentleman named Alan Gerry has been the driving force behind Bethel Woods Center for the Performing Arts. And what has been built on the original site of the Woodstock festival is nothing short of spectacular. An outdoor, 15,000 seat covered natural amphitheater, with a lawn area at the rear. I took the hour-long drive to Bethel Woods earlier this week, with my 16-year-old son Zac and my buddy Doc, to see The Allman Brothers play, preceded by Bob Weir and Rat Dog as the opening act.

The place is bucolic as ever, situated in the rolling Catskill farmland. The parking lots are paved and well marked. The traffic control on the way in, is cordial and efficient. The venue is a pristine campus of natural wood-and-glass buildings surrounded by lush lawns and wide brick paths and patios.

We arrived early, a little before 5pm, for the 6:30 opening act. We stopped to see an acquaintance, the Mike Quick Band, playing at the band shell near the main gate. Sometime around 5:30, the sky started crying for about 5 minutes, and shortly thereafter, a full 180-degree bright-bright rainbow stretched over the grounds. How appropriate that above the scene of Woodstock, where the East Coast hippie movement coalesced, where now 5000 tied-dyed aging Dead Heads and their descendants (not to mention the the equally hippified Allman fans) all looked skyward as one, with glazed eyes and mouths agape, all moaning hushed “Ooooohs” and “Wow mans.”

As for Mike Quick and his band, they were awesome, and at 6pm, a woman from the Center gave Mike the “cut” sign, so that folks would start heading toward the main stage about 1/4 mile away. Mike begged to play just one more, and the crowd of about 200-300 or so all joined in, loudly cajoling her with chants of “One more!”

Well, 45 minutes later, when an exhausted Quick finally wailed his last note, we could hear Bob Weir and Rat Dog playing in the distance. Quick has crashed the opening act, and the crowd had stayed, only reluctantly making their way to the Main Stage.

The scene was a fun one to watch, with a mixed crowd of Dead Heads there to see Bob Weir and his band, and those Allman Brothers fans there to see the main act. The Dead Heads were in full regalia; lots of tie-dye, lots of flowing sun dresses, sandals and flowered (although graying) hair. My son was especially amused by all the “wasted old people” (his words) and I enjoyed the irony of watching a paunchy, balding gent heading up the aisle, in his brightly colored, brand new tie-dyed t-shirt that was tucked in (huh?) to his crisp khaki Dockers (huh?), and as he got far enough up the aisle, he reached around his back and pulled his Blackberry from it's holster and started talking furiously, undoubtedly with his stockbroker. Ah, the times they are a-changin'.

At one point during the Allman's part of the show, Zac and I went for a run to the men's room. On the way back, a 20-something be-spangled bra-less, sun-dressed spinny-girl (sometimes known as acid-twirlers) jumped in front of Zac, looked at him and cooed, “Oooooh you're cuuuuuuuuute!” Zac kept on moving, but she persisted. “What's your name?”  “Uh, Zac.” he replied, trying to up his pace. “Feel the love Zac! The world is like a balloon filled with love, man! Check out our balloon, Zac. It's filled with love…”

We kept on walking, leaving the young lass to spread her gospel to someone who'd appreciate it.

Needless to say, I've enjoyed turning to Zac every few hours over the past few days, and cooing ,” Oooooh you're cuuuuuuuuute!”