On 18 June 1967 at the County Fairgrounds, the Monterey Pop Festival attracted around 200,000 people, although not all at the same time, to what was the first major rock festival in America. It was organised by Lou Adler, John Phillips of The Mamas and The Papas and Derek Taylor, the former Beatles publicist and their ambition was to create an event that was multi-cultural, multi-national and multi-styled in the music that was performed. It was truly a ‘first’ and it can be considered the premier event of the Summer of Love’; one at which everything seemed to work and about which nothing bad has ever been written.
In particular Monterey helped launch the careers of many performers, catapulting them from local, or relative obscurity, into the forefront of American and worldwide awareness. Today it’s easy to forget that before Monterey Jimi Hendrix had not had a hit record in America. Neither had The Who managed to get a record into the Billboard Top 20 and only one of their four minor hits had got higher than No.51; nor was Otis Redding very well known among white audiences. Rolling Stone, Brian Jones was there according to one report he was, "In a mind shattering gold lame coat festooned with beads, crystal swastika & lace, looked like a kind of unofficial King of the Festival" Brian Jones was the king of Hippie-chic.
“ This is really a great scene here. All the kids are so nice. The people are so polite and just come up and talk to me and say they like the way I'm dressed" – Brian Jones
Press attention from around the world, and particularly the music press alerted fans to what was happening, but it wasn’t until the end of 1968 that people were able to see the documentary made by D.A Pennebaker – for most people this was the first time that they actually saw Jimi Hendrix set fire to his Stratocaster. It has not had the effect of the Woodstock movie, which could be put down to the fact that the commercial precepts were less well developed at this point. Big business had not cottoned onto the money making potential of a ‘bunch of hippies.’
"I was with Brian for the Monterey Pop Festival & we took acid in a tepee" – Dennis Hopper
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