Martha Rosenberg: Remembering Woodstock's Women Musicians -- Both of Them

http://blog.buzzflash.com/contributors/2052


No one was texting Mom im ok bt wet from Woodstock says the New York Times' Gail Collins, one of the few columnists to admit having been there. (And how old are you?)

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No, in those days the handheld devices audiences consecrated bands with were (anyone?) Bics -- yet somehow the event was recorded without the legions of volunteer citizen documentarians operating today.

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Imagine boarding a plane without the airline knowing your age, address, travel history, spending habits, and outstanding balance. Imagine buying tickets with no Ticketron. Who remembers anonymity? Who misses it?

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Despite Collins' 2004 book America's Women: Four Hundred Years of Dolls, Drudges, Helpmates, and Heroines, she's yet to comment on the "position" of women performers at Woodstock -- both of them, Janis Joplin and Jefferson Airplane's Grace Slick -- which was probably as Black Power leader Stokely Carmichael said of women in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) "prone."

Not only did women not front bands in those days, play rock instruments before Suzi Quatro and Joan Jett, or mess their dos (before Joplin), but also they didn't even hold title to their own bodies. As in the Grateful Dead's famous line from Jack Straw, "We can share the women; we can share the wine." Hello?

Nor did Arlo, anti-macho mascot though he was -- who made litter not war -- doubt women were in the public domain with his Don't Touch My Bags lyric, "Hip woman walking on a moving floor/Tripping on the escalator /There's a man in the line, and she's blowing his mind /Thinking that he's already made her."

One woman remembers a hitchhiker asking her boyfriend if he could have a "crack at her" during share-the-women days. "Can he?" she asked her boyfriend.

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Yet imagine an oppressed group not just tolerating but rocking to, "I'm going down to shoot my old lady; You know, I've caught her messin' around with another man," as women did to Hendrix' Hey, Joe. "And I gave her the gun/I SHOT HER!"

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And the guy who could open a bottle with his teeth and drink you under the table was Janis Joplin from Port Arthur, Texas.

There's another difference between Woodstock and Lollapalooza. Back then, no one had heard of rehab.
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And Grace Slick would beg to differ about "fronting" bands...

I suddenly realized that I hadn't seen a hitch hiker in years. I know it took a deep hit in the 1980's when municipalities passed laws against hitch hiking or picking up hitch hikers in the name of safety as well as getting rid of one behavior sometimes used to obscure prostitution and drug dealing. But I don't think I have seen anyone hitch hiking in a couple of years now. I figured that crack, meth, and carjacking probably finished what the municipalities started.

Also, Joni Mitchell was scheduled but cancelled for a tv appearance.

Granted, still FAR outnumbered by the male performers, but there were more than 2........

(sorry - I posted before reading the same reply above)

Joan Baez sang the organizing song "Joe Hill". It's on the album and was in the movie. DOn't know how or why the could have missed it. I know Melanie performed also.

But somewhat marred by the lack of research and factchecking.

The lack of care went into establishing the particulars makes me question the rest of the message, however potenially insightful. C'mon, this was the latter twentieth century not the twentieth dynasty, and even I, born in '63, have personally met, conversed and learned from several people who either saw Woodstock or Altamont(or as an overwhelming number of these did, saw both). At least pick up the freaking liner notes for the album.

Hats off to those who spotted BS.

and went to the kitchen during Melanie's gig:rofl:

she was right on about the airport stuff..

anonymity was good back then:) you could travel on someone else's ticket..no one cared..