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Fact #154885

When:

Short story:

Appearing on the second day of The Bath Festival Of Blues and Progressive Music at the Bath And West Showground, Shepton Mallet, England, UK, Europe, are Led Zeppelin, Jefferson Airplane, Frank Zappa and the Mothers Of Invention, The Moody Blues, The Byrds, Flock, Santana, Dr John, Country Joe McDonald and Hot Tuna.

Full article:

Sandra Elsdon-Vigon (girlfriend of Fleetwood Mac’s Peter Green) : Peter and I had a big fight because Carlos (Santana) was plying him with cocaine and acid and whatever else. It was awful, because I could see that Peter was someone who shouldn’t touch anything like that.

Stuart Cruikshank (audience) : My abiding memory is of rain. There was a downpour during Jefferson Airplane and The Byrds had to play acoustic because it was too dangerous to plug in.

Peter Grant (manager, Led Zeppelin) : I worked out exactly where the stage should go and planned their appearance so that the natural light would gradually fade and the lighting rig gradually take over. It was spectacular.

Roy Carr (joumalist) : The show had zero production values, just set up the back line and off you go but, at the same time, there was none of the musical excess of the later Zep. They looked like four lads who'd driven out to the country for a day's fun but they played a blinder. During Whole Lotta Love they threw tambourines into the crowd and everyone went berserk.

Peter Grant : I spotted a bootleg film crew under the stage. I couldn’t find anyone from the promoter’s office so I took things into my own hands. I threw a bucket of water over the equipment, waited until I was sure that I wouldn’t be electrocuted, and then waded in with an axe, chopping everything up.

Roger McGuinn (The Byrds) : I remember it quite clearly. It all ran very late and was raining like crazy, so there was some worry about electrocution, so they turned off all the power on the stage. Everything was being horribly delayed, we’d been there al night waiting to play, so we eventually decided we couldn’t keep the crowd waiting any longer, and the only way to do that was to go out and do these songs which people knew as electric rock songs as an acoustic set in the early hours of the morning. And everybody loved it, and they went crazy, and it was a great feeling.

Johnny Black (audience) : I really can’t remember any outstanding performances but I do remember getting very annoyed during Led Zeppelin’s set. They always annoyed me anyway, as I felt their act was just about the worst form of pandering to the lowest common denominator of rock fan – for me they were too loud, stodgy, derivative, ham-fisted and pretentious. It came to a peak for me when they started to bludgeon their insensitive way through a version of Hello Mr Soul, a song I adored by Buffalo Springfield. This was sacrilege. I remember standing up, uttering all manner of foul oaths and curses, much to the surprise of my companions, and stomping off back to my tent.

Rod Allen (journalist) : Bath was the only festival that really worked. The promoter, Fred Bannister, made about £100,000, the freaks were satisfied, there was complete warmth and an utter lack of bovver.