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Just as Woodstock rose again, so shall its U.K. counterpart. Thirty-two years after its infamous finale, the Isle of Wight Festival has been revived for this coming summer. The reborn happening will tale place Monday, June 3rd, on the backend of The Queen's Jubilee, a British holiday weekend celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of Her Majesty's coronation.
Promoters will shortly announce which bands will make up Wight 2002's bill. It's expected to be a U.K.-intensive rock show, with Pulp, Ash, the Charlatans, Manic Street Preachers, Placebo, New Yorkers the Strokes and Swedes the Hives topping the organizers' short list.
The Isle of Wight's initial three-year run culminated in a chaotic 1970 affair that truly redefined festival madness. Some 600,000 folks, most ticketless, descended on East Afton Farm, on the unsuspecting English Channel island, to hear the likes of the Who, Jimi Hendrix (in his final U.K. performance), Jethro Tull, the Moody Blues, Miles Davis, Joan Baez, the Doors (in their final U.K. gig with Jim Morrison), Joni Mitchell and Sly and the Family Stone. As with Woodstocks past and present, potable water was scarce and toilets rarer still.
"We want to recreate the vibe of the Isle of Wight festival in the twenty-first century," says John Giddings of event organizers, the Solo Agency. "So, we're gonna have toilets this time. How about that for a concept!"
The 1970, multi-night show was immortalized on two albums -- one a compilation drawing from several artists' sets and the other offering the Who's performance in its entirety. Director Murray Lerner captured the event in his acclaimed documentary, Message of Love.
"It's taken thirty years for the people of the Isle of Wight to recover from the amount of people that descended on them in 1970," Giddings says. "But they now realize that the name Isle of Wight is synonymous with music festivals worldwide, right alongside Woodstock and Glastonbury. They see this as a great asset for the island to sell for tourism."
A Wight invite was also extended to Oasis, but, according to Giddings, the Gallagher brothers balked at the amount of Solo's offer. "They said they were washing their hair that evening," he says, laughing. "They obviously weren't interested in the history."
Organizers hope to make the Isle of Wight Festival an annual occurrence and a new player in a U.K. festival circuit already crowded by the likes of Glastonbury, Leeds and Redding. Unlike those events, however, where noted DJs make up a fare share of the bill, Wight looks to be pure rock & roll.
"I don't want any dance music," says Giddings. "I don't want any of that crap. We want real songs played by real people. Anyone with a cassette machine can go away."
GREG HELLER
(January 17, 2002)