Rolling Stones At Altamont thoughts

From Keith's book:
That was where the Angels certainly didn't help. They had their own agenda, which was to basically get as out of it as possible. Hardly an organized security force. Some of those guys, their eyes are rolling, they're chewing their lips. And the deliberate provocation of parking their choppers in front of the stage. Because you can't touch an Angel's chopper, apparently. It's absolutely verboten. They put up a barrier of their Harleys and defied people to touch them. And with the crowd pressing forward it was unavoidable. If you watch Gimme Shelter, one Angel face says it all. He's basically foaming at the mouth, he's got tattoos, the leathers and the ponytail, and he's just waiting for somebody to touch his chopper so he can go to work.

In the days when 'there was revolution in the air' I think the bands were attracted to the idea of having the Angels as their own security. I can see how that made sense at the time. And Barger was no fool, there were some sharp guys in there from what I remember from Thompson's book. But they blew it at Altamont.

The Hunter situation is what complicates things because they may have saved Jagger or somebody else's life.

 

Richards is clearly heard telling a member of the Hells Angels that he wants them to stop pushing people around between Sympathy and The Sun is Shining. Not sure if that is from the bootleg or the film.

 

Nicely put Shem.
What I find abhorrent are the people who condemn the entire counterculture movement because of this concert. I still believe and practice a lot of those ideals, so to have people lay the blame on the counterculture does bother me to a certain extent. I don't mean, sex, drugs, and rock and roll, but the ideals that we all can be together, treat each other with respect, and be kind to each other.
This show and Manson was used by the media to condemn the entire movement and its' core belief system.
Sorry to thread cap! Just had to get this off my chest after reading all 19 pages of this thread.

 

This whole post was excellent but this is a very salient point in among all the "evil" and Hell's Angels stuff.

"After all, it was you and me..."

 

Reading this thread has prompted me to pull out my DVD and give the movie a re-watch (starting at the climax, then "rewinding" to the beginning). A couple of quick observations:

(a) It's pretty clear that there were a lot of bad vibes to go around, and the Angels were hardly the only ones provoking confrontations. One indicator of this is, it seems like every third person has a gallon jug of cheap red wine. Booze, meth, and cramped quarters full of similarly out of it people creates a scene where violence of some degree of violence is probably inevitable. It's not like the audience were just smoking pot and getting a peaceful easy feeling on before the Hells Angels started displaying heavy manners.
(b) Interestingly enough, there are some scenes where the Angels are actually being fairly helpful, directing the casualties on stage back into the audience without getting violent or pulling the semi-conscious out of the crowd. Not that this counters whacking people around with weighted pool cues, but still.

 

Is this this bit just after "Under My Thumb"?

Keith:"We're splitting if those cats don't stop beating everybody up - I want them out of the way, man! I don't like - "
Hells Angel (runs over to Keith): "Hey hey hey, there's a guy with a gun out there and he's shooting at the stage!"
Keith: "He's got a gun, oh..."

 

It's after Under My Thumb in the film, although apparently it was actually between a breakdown of that song and the complete version seen in the film at the show.

 

I was at Newport Pop Festival in june 1969 there were 300,000 people there. 95% of the audience was cool. The last day the Hells Angels started a riot and were the troublemakers not the hippies!

 

This idea that the Stones just didn't know. Poor dears.

They didn't care. Until they were in the middle of the violence. The red lights and devil horns weren't a joke anymore when their Angels started whipping those pool cues in their faces.

 

Hippie is a generic term to describe most young people of the 60's/70's who looked anything outside of clean haircuts, slacks, and a pressed button down shirt. Doesn't matter if they were military vets, auto mechanics, college kids, bikers, gals who worked in department stores, actually from a commune, or whatever. They're all hippies. Loaded on drugs, resisting the man, doing it every chance they could.

 

Red lights? Devils horns? (actually, they'd still be funny -- even in a swirl of pool cues)

 

And there is also the less dramatic bit earlier after "Sympathy", where Keef points out someone and says "That guy there, if he doesn't stop it...either those cats cool it or we don't play!" Followed by a more belligerent-sounding Angel barking "If you don't cool it you ain't gonna hear no music, so do you wanna go home or what?!?"

 

A silly painting of Satan on Jagger's chest (ala R 'n R Circus) would have turned it all in to farce.

 

I feel like this thread needs some Angels security presence. Not the violence so much as somebody just sitting at the side looking dangerous - "Don't you dare quote my post."

 

Some people are surely wielding their wit with all the subtlety and good humor of a weighted pool cue.

 

Have you ever SEEN some of the gorts here? Talk about dangerous!

 

Yes I know. I was responding to this (posted above):
"As for the "hippie audience," Altamont was anything from a hippy dippy, flowers-in-your-hair event. There were too many bad seeds and meth heads in attendance for that moniker to stick. That's why some of us laugh at these comments coming from such removed (and misinformed) perches later."

 

Haven't seen one lately....

 

Check out some of their avatars!

 

From my future book on this thread: "It was like Dante's Inferno. It was spreading out in concentric waves.."

 

Speaking of avatars, I think it might be time to retire SNL Mick and bring this guy:

 

He's a Hells Angels prospect. Showing the Angels he can handle the bad acid.

 

Thank you

 

LOL

 

An excellent summation IMO