Lollapalooza Book returns the wild and revolutionary roots of the festival

In 1990, Jane's Addiction launched “the usual ritual”, the album acclaimed by the criticism of Los Angeles Alternative-Metal Band. The band, harassed by drug addiction, power struggles and dissension, decided to break the peak of their popularity.

The main singer Perry Farrell came up with the idea of ​​Lollapalooza, a “woodstock for lost generation,” according to the New York Times, as a farewell tour for the implosive group. But it would become much more.

Between 1991 and 1997, the itinerant circus of an excited, entertaining and empowered festival young people discontent, especially in their glorious early years. “If lollapalooza didn't single-tandedly inaugurate what came to be known as 'Alternative Nation,' it went a long way toward codifying its ideals for a generation of teens and twentysomethings via Diverse Mix of Boundary-Pushing Musical Acts, Outsider Fashion and Art, Political Activism, and Straight-Up Performative Weirdness, ”Richard Biestock and Tom Beaujour Write in Their Excellent Oral History,” Lollapalooza: The unsecured story of the wildest festival of alternative rock “.

As the authors argue convincingly, the impact of Lollapalooza cannot be underestimated. Inspired the successful Ozzfest, Lilith Fair, Horde and the Warped tour; brought combat boots, flannel, piercings, tattoos and other young accessories once marginalized to the mainstream; and helped convert nine -inch nails and pearl jam into superstar. So powerful is the control of Lollapaloaza about the popular culture that Farrell revived it in 2003. The festival continues to this day, attracting more than 100,000 fans to the Chicago Grant Park every summer.

At the beginning of Lollapalooza, the festivals had become Passé, with the United States festival, the Summer Jam in Watkins Glen and the Monterey Pop Festival, little more than nebular memories. The eclectic inaugural alignment of Lollapalooza, which goes from Jane's addiction to the strong fusion of the Rollins band to rapper Ice-T to the Post-Punk Siouxise pioneers and the Banshees, barely seemed like a bill to put the world and sell to the Amphitheaters throughout the country.

In fact, Lollapalooza almost derailed in his first show on July 18, 1991, in the suffocating Terrace Compton in Chandler, Arizona. With temperatures in the triple digits, the nine -inch nail team did not work, which led Trent Reznor to garbage to rely on the stage. Dave Navarro, Jane's talented guitarist, the talented guitarist, and Farrell began to push themselves to the side of the stage after the band's set. “The tour could have collapsed there,” said Kevin Lyman, scene director of Lollapalooza in 1991 and 1992.

But he didn't. The combination of the Diario Left Artists Festival, Defense Groups such as Handgun Control Inc. and the National Abortion Rights Action League, and Funky Food and Drinks captured the Zeitgeist. In one of the worst seasons of summer concerts in more than a decade, Lollapalooza shone brilliantly.

Things would only improve.

With an alternative nation in the ancestry, the classic “Nevermind” of Nirvana and the Smash Red Hot Chili Peppers' Simn Solle Sugar Sex Magik “came out after the first festival – Lollapalooza 1992 was prepared to explode. Farrell and Company booked future superstars like Pearl Jam, whose album” had ” Grunge of Seattle Soundgarden;

Lollapalooza 1992 introduced the second stage for artists, possibly the first of its kind, which presented new hot acts: Rage Against The Machine and Stone Temple Pilots gave some of his first performances there. The Jim Rose Circus Sideshow, a monstrous show that had slug the swallower, The Torture King and some kind that drank vomiting, became a favorite of the crowd, making the world safe for the television program “The Jim Rose Twisted Tour”.

Cover of Lollapalooza: The Uncensored Story of Alternative Rock's Wildest Festival

(St. Martin's Press)

Biestock and Beaujour, through their attractive and insightful interviews, capture the liberating ethos and anything that was Lollapallooza 1992. I must know; I attended the opening show at the Shoreline amphitheater in the Bay area.

Touching the second slot behind Lush in the Midday Sun, Pearl Jam burned through his set with new songs such as “Alive” and “Jeremy.” One of the most charismatic and talented rock leaders, Eddie Vedder, often raised the scaffolding and speakers and dived into the crowd, doing whatever it is necessary to get the attention of the audience.

The ministry also caused an indelible impression, pieces of everyone's eardrums. The singer to the Jourgensen, supported against a statue of animal bones that served as a microphone support, and his bandmates hit the public to submit with their hypnotic heaviness, regularly paying fines for exceeding the noise limits of the place. Pearl Jam's guitarist, Stone Gossard, called the show as a “Sound Bill.”

Lollapalooza 1992 was the culminating point of the festival. He would never have the same cultural and artistic resonance. The 1993 edition had a less impressive alignment headed by Primus and Alice in Chains. In 1994, the organizers were close to catching Nirvana as the poster head of that year before Kurt Cobain over was overdose in Rome and committed suicide a month later in April. As strong as the 1994 artists who broke pumpkins, Beastie Boys, George Clinton and the P-Funk Allstars and the breeders, could not compare with Nirvana.

The 1995 disappointing alignment presented the young Rock Color of Art-Rock in 1995, but fans remained remote. The so-called “artypalooza” gave way to Lollapalooza 1996, called “Doube-Apalooza” for its predominantly white and aggressive alignment full of metallica decidedly not alternative; Farrell temporarily left the festival in protest.

Lollapalooza 1997, its swan before revival, biased to ambitious electronic sounds of artists such as Prodigy, the orb and the orbital, a laudable attempt but finally without success of revitalizing the festival that once gold.

When reflecting the fall of Lollapalooza of the rarege heights of its peak of the early 90s, the 1997 version made just over half of Lilith Fair's money, attracting an average assistance of 67% of the capacity of the place compared to 93% for that festival dominated by women. “Lolla had her career, and we knew that the model was breaking. She became too generic. She burned too bright,” said the Co -founder of the Marc Geiger festival. “I needed a break.”

Ken Bethea, on the left, and Rhett Miller of Old 97 act in the second stage in Lollapalooza in 1997.

(Sarah P. Weiss)

Fortunately, “Lollapalooza” the book, unlike the homonymous festival, rarely flag. Biestock and Beaujour, also authors of the best selling, “Nöthin 'but a good time: the uncensored story of the Hard Rock explosion of the 80s,” he interviewed hundreds of artists, tour founders and organizers of Lolaspalooza, among others. His is a fun, flat and surprisingly moving reading.

They instill their book with sex, drugs and rock and roll. Joe Klein, then Siouxsie guitarist and the Banshees, for example, recalled “the most visible orgies: the Ice-T tourist bus, presumably full of grupies, bouncing up and down. The heroine and other hard drugs were a pillar of the tour. The late Mark Lanegan, the main singer of the trees that shout, often sent a gofer to track heroin, crack and methamphetamine during the '96 tour. Or he would look for drugs. “We arrived in a city, and he headed directly to Gueto and was almost killed,” said Trees guitar Gary Lee Conner.

And what could be more rock and roll than the members of Rage Against The Machine, the stars of Lollapalooza '93, naked in a show in Philadelphia to protest the parent's music resources center, the controversial Tipper Gore group that pressed for the parents of advice of the parents in certain albums. With black tape in the mouth and the lyrics P, M, R, C written in large letters in their chests, the types of anger were still for 15 minutes, the comments of the guitar served as their accompaniment music. Angry fans finally threw possible revolutionaries with beer, cups and even urine bottles.

That Lollapalooza has become such an important chapter in the annals of rock history cannot surprise anyone but Farrell. “They often ask me, did I think Lollapalooza was going to be what became?” said. “I mean, that's ridiculous. Of course not! How could I?

Ballon, an old Times, Forbes and Inc. Magazine Reporter, teaches an advanced writing class in the USC. Live in Fullerton.