Woodstock 99 (Documentary)

[South Austin 52,771]

Seemed appropriate to post in this forum and didn't see a thread in the Movies & TV forum.  Has anyone seen the Woodstock 99 documentary, currently streaming on HBO/Max?  It's a good bit of nostalgia and captures pretty well a slice of American culture during that time.  I was never a fan of much of the post-grunge music of the late 1990s, but a lot of the commentators came down pretty harsh on the "souless," angry white boy, misogynistic music from the likes of Limp Bizkit and Kid Rock. 

Woodstock 99 occurred right around the time I was studying or sitting for the bar exam, so I didn't really follow it back then.  I had no idea what a shit show it was in terms of sexual assault claims, property destruction, flooding of the grounds with sewage water, and the eventual rioting and looting of the last night.

[Deej 77,312]

Watched it last weekend. Pretty good. Sexual assaults at festivals aren't exclusive to Woodstock '99. Coachella has had some high numbers in the past. I imagine others, too. Most, like at Woodstock '99 don't get officially reported it seems. It also seemed like a bad idea to have that thing on a big piece of concrete in the middle of summer. 

Somewhat related, did anyone catch Limp Bizkit this weekend? Fuck, we're getting old.

Fred Durst:

 

[Herpa Derpa 6,175]

Nice wig. 

[South Austin 52,771]

52 minutes ago, Deej said:

Somewhat related, did anyone catch Limp Bizkit this weekend? Fuck, we're getting old.

Yeah, and the guys from The Offspring were in the documentary and they don't appear to have aged well.

[oSuJeff97 3,435]

I watched it. Thought it was pretty good.

I did think *a few* of the connections they were trying to make were a bit of a reach:

• Like when Jewell was talking about how she and Sheryl Crow were the only female acts and sort of insinuating that the crowd wasn't interested in them... cut to a clip of the crowd cheering wildly when she was introduced.... (?) ... and then shows Sheryl Crow with the crowd clearly into her set as well.
• One of the talking heads noted that Gavin Rossdale brought Robbie Krieger out to play with them and said something like, "the crowd couldn't care less and didn't know who he was..." Again, cut to the video of Rossdale introducing him and the crowd cheering wildly...lol

Was Fred Durst a huge asshole for egging the (already agitated) crowd on? Sure. But, as is normally the case when these things go south, I put like 95% of the blame on the promoters/organizers.

Did they get some bad luck with the weather being brutally hot? Sure. But they held an outdoor festival that would attract nearly a half a million people in LATE JULY. The fuck did you expect? Hot weather + lack of cooling facilities/water + everything being crazy expensive = hundreds of thousands of uncomfortable, pissed off people.

I don't care what acts are playing, that's a recipe for disaster every time.

It's just WAY too easy to take few clips of Limp Bizkit or whomever playing and talk about how this festival was the seed of "toxic masculinity" or whatever... this was a logistics/organization failure more than anything and I thought they let the promoters/organizers off WAY too easy. 

[South Austin 52,771]

The documentary and the Woodstock 99 lineup was a reminder that by and large there was a lot of shitty music in the 90s after the grunge movement wore off.

Collective Soul, The Offspring, Limp Bizkit, Kid Rock, Korn, Bush (don't get me started on how awful Bush is), Live, Creed, Dave Matthews Band (fight me).  That lineup does not hold up well.

 

[Don Johnson 4,760]

DMX plays "My N***" and puts the mic out for the crowd to sign the chorus.  What exactly do you think is going to happen there?

Yet the doc is like, "sure he did that, but they just seemed soooo eager to say that word."

6:00 mark

 

[Cheeseweasel 26,438]

4 hours ago, Herpa Derpa said:

Nice wig. 

Obviously he did it for the nookie. 

[oSuJeff97 3,435]

24 minutes ago, Don Johnson said:

DMX plays "My N***" and puts the mic out for the crowd to sign the chorus.  What exactly do you think is going to happen there?

Yet the doc is like, "sure he did that, but they just seemed soooo eager to say that word."

6:00 mark

 

 

Yes that's another example of what I was talking about.  They were "eager" to say it... of course they were... they were "eager" to sing along with song they loved by an artist they loved, just like everyone does at every concert.

It's like someone went in with the idea that Woodstock '99 was somehow patient zero for "toxic masculinity" and then pulled some clips and some talking heads opine about it at every turn to drive home the narrative.

There was probably legit *some* of that going on, just because of the bands they invited, but to me (again) the larger story was one of complete and utter incompetence on the part of the organizers/promoters... from the lack of infrastructure to support a crowd of that size in that weather, to the inadequate and ill-trained "security" personnel.  That's what the story should have been about.

[Deej 77,312]

1 hour ago, Cheeseweasel said:

Obviously he did it for the nookie. 

 

[Cheeseweasel 26,438]

[PRONG HORN 3,167]

8 hours ago, South Austin said:

a lot of the commentators came down pretty harsh on the "souless," angry white boy, misogynistic music from the likes of Limp Bizkit and Kid Rock. 

 

It's okay when angry misogynistic black boys do it because they are not "soulless".  It's all about the soul my brotha.  

 

 

Edited August 2, 2021 by PRONG HORN

[South Austin 52,771]

3 hours ago, oSuJeff97 said:

 

Yes that's another example of what I was talking about.  They were "eager" to say it... of course they were... they were "eager" to sing along with song they loved by an artist they loved, just like everyone does at every concert.

It's like someone went in with the idea that Woodstock '99 was somehow patient zero for "toxic masculinity" and then pulled some clips and some talking heads opine about it at every turn to drive home the narrative.

There was probably legit *some* of that going on, just because of the bands they invited, but to me (again) the larger story was one of complete and utter incompetence on the part of the organizers/promoters... from the lack of infrastructure to support a crowd of that size in that weather, to the inadequate and ill-trained "security" personnel.  That's what the story should have been about.

You’re obviously a closet Limp Bizkit fan.

[Deej 77,312]

So, look at the actual lineup. Not nearly as many angry white boy bands as they made it seem.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodstock_'99

[South Austin 52,771]

37 minutes ago, Deej said:

So, look at the actual lineup. Not nearly as many angry white boy bands as they made it seem.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodstock_'99

Creed made a lot of white boys angry.

[trza-hawk 269]

It wasn't as good as the original Woodstock back in '94.

[jetsfan76 743]

Looking at the set list for LB for the upcoming Stubb's show, (I'm going for Spiritbox) they do a shit ton of covers. It might be 50/50 covers vs originals.

[CooterBrown 18,151]

It wasn't as good as the original Woodstock back in '94.

[Napoleon 8,733]

17 hours ago, trza-hawk said:

It wasn't as good as the original Woodstock back in '94.

 

1 hour ago, CooterBrown said:

I stoped by the festivities in Bethel, NY on old man Yasgur's farm back in the summer of 1994 and apart from a hacky sack and maybe a shitty beaded necklace, I didn't take much away from the concert.

There were rumors of people from the '69 show making appearances, but that sure as fuck didn't happen.

The highlight was the DAUGHTER of some singer named "Melanie" performing on stage with her in the afternoon. The daughter had long tan legs, nice rack, and well tended bleached blonde hair. Looked kink of like a Playmate after '90s Hef had her at the house for 6 to 12 months. She was hot.

But it shared a lot with "Waiting For Guffman" (1996). Maybe it was the inspiration.

[83Horn 1,660]

25 minutes ago, Napoleon said:

 

I stoped by the festivities in Bethel, NY on old man Yasgur's farm back in the summer of 1994 and apart from a hacky sack and maybe a shitty beaded necklace, I didn't take much away from the concert.

There were rumors of people from the '69 show making appearances, but that sure as fuck didn't happen.

The highlight was the DAUGHTER of some singer named "Melanie" performing on stage with her in the afternoon. The daughter had long tan legs, nice rack, and well tended bleached blonde hair. Looked kink of like a Playmate after '90s Hef had her at the house for 6 to 12 months. She was hot.

But it shared a lot with "Waiting For Guffman" (1996). Maybe it was the inspiration.

There's a reason not much was going on where you were:

From Wiki:  "The event took place on Winston Farm, just west of Saugerties, New York, about 100 miles (160 km) north of New York City and 70 miles (110 km) northeast of the original 1969 festival site near Bethel, which had 12,000 on hand to celebrate the silver anniversary^.."

[Deej 77,312]

6 hours ago, 83Horn said:

There's a reason not much was going on where you were:

From Wiki:  "The event took place on Winston Farm, just west of Saugerties, New York, about 100 miles (160 km) north of New York City and 70 miles (110 km) northeast of the original 1969 festival site near Bethel, which had 12,000 on hand to celebrate the silver anniversary^.."

 

[alincoln 2,385]

Awful doc that worked backwards from its desired conclusions without even a hint of subtlety.  

No mystery why mainstream rock music died given how unbelievably shitty the genre had become.  

[oSuJeff97 3,435]

4 hours ago, alincoln said:

Awful doc that worked backwards from its desired conclusions without even a hint of subtlety.  

No mystery why mainstream rock music died given how unbelievably shitty the genre had become.  

The weird thing is that they DID have a compelling story.... about how fucking incompetent the organizers/promoters were... kind of like a Fyre Festival that actually happened.... that should have been the primary story.... the toxic masculinity/overbearing dudebro presence was definitely also a thing... it just wasn't the MAIN thing, and shouldn't have been the focus of the doc.

[South Austin 52,771]

Hey, at least they showed a lot of tits.

[CAHorn 102]

As others have already said it felt very heavy handed pushing the evil white homophobic, misogynistic narrative. 

I loved the part at the end where they tried to tell us that women shouldn't be blamed for going into the mosh pit and getting hurt. Most MEN don't belong in a mosh pit. Nobody's protecting you, it's classic assumption of the risk.

Also, the only person that we actually heard about getting arrested for sexual assault during the doc was...a NY State prison guard. 

Woodstock '94 had major problems with mud, sanitation, infrastructure, etc. I knew people who bailed after a day because of it being a shitshow (pun intended).

The same guys did the same thing five years later and somehow got even worse at putting on a festival. The bald dude is still defending they're crappy planning like he did everything right. I dislike Durst as much as the next guy but he didn't create the problems, they did.

Final thought: When the guy was shown passing out candles in the first hour it might have been the most obvious foreshadowing I've ever seen. How was this allowed to happen? It's not like we didn't know what fire was in 1999.

 

[Bender Bending Rodriguez 1,705]

On 8/2/2021 at 10:39 AM, South Austin said:

Yeah, and the guys from The Offspring were in the documentary and they don't appear to have aged well.

The lead singer of The Offspring went on to receive a PhD in Molecular Biology. 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dexter_Holland

[trza-hawk 269]

Army Base Rape Rock? Real subtle stuff from Moby. Keep in mind this was around the time Moby thought he was Natalie Portman's boyfriend and he wrote a book about it with some of the worst writing you will ever experience and somehow the passage about him describing himself as too emotionally damaged to go out with Natalie Portman somehow this stays in the book after being edited and proofread is beyond me.