GQ India – August 2019

102 — AUGUST 2019

WRITTEN BY UDAY BENEGAL

Looking back at Woodstock: the 1970 doc that opened up my mind

SIGHT AND SOUND

I

was 13 when I first watched Woodstock. The

year was 1980. I’d heard that Eros cinema in

downtown Bombay would randomly screen

the documentary on a Sunday at 9:15am. I

scoured the movie listings for months, until

my tenacity paid off. There it was, on the Times Of

India movie page, a single, early-morning showing

of the hallowed film.

Thanks to my college-going brother, I had access

to an expanding record collection of 1960s and

1970s rock. Contained within it was a well-worn

triple LP of the Woodstock concert. I knew the

album from start to finish – every song, power chord,

guitar/drum/keyboard solo, cheer, squawk, thank you,

amp feedback and megaphone call-out. I’d heard it a

hundred times; I’d been on stage in my head each of

those times. Missing the movie was not an option.

I harboured no hope of recruiting any of my pop-

loving friends to join me for a crack-of-dawn viewing

of toked-out hedonists protesting an irrelevant (to us)

war, to the soundtrack of raucous guitars and pounding

drums. So, that Sunday, I made my way to Kemp’s

Corner and hopped onto a BEST double-decker bus, No

122, to Churchgate. I can’t recall if there was anyone

Half a million people gathered

at Woodstock for the festival;

(Opposite) Director Michael

Wadleigh; The original

documentary poster