The Complete Monterey Pop Festival- (The Criterion Collection) [Blu-ray] Overview
On a beautiful June weekend in 1967 at the height of the so-called "summer of love," the first and only Monterey International Pop Festival roared forward - capturing a decade's spirit and ushering in a new era of rock and roll. Monterey would launch the careers of Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, and Otis Redding, but they were just a few among a wildly diverse cast including Simon and Garfunkel, The Mamas and the Papas, The Who, The Byrds, Hugh Masekela, and the extraordinary Ravi Shankar. With his characteristic verite style, D.A. Pennebaker captured it all, immortalizing those moments that have become legend: Pete Townshend destroying his guitar; Jimi Hendrix burning his. The Criterion Collection is proud to present the most comprehensive document of The Monterey International Pop Festival ever produced, featuring all three films of the festival - "Monterey Pop" (1967, 80min.), "Jimi Plays Monterey" (1986, 50min.) and "Shake! Otis At Monterey" (1987, 18min.) - along with nearly every complete performance filmed by Pennebaker and his crew, the "Outtakes" (1997, 120min.).
Stills from Monterey Pop Festival (Click for larger image)
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The Complete Monterey Pop Festival- (The Criterion Collection) [Blu-ray] Specifications
A special message from Lou Adler, an original promoter/producer for the Monterey International Pop Festival:
It was the first major Rock ‘n’ Roll Festival. No prerequisite…no precedents. We had no idea what to expect. The question of would people come was answered by mid-week prior to the start of the festival. They came and kept on coming. A major surprise was the extent of mainstream media coverage. When John Phillips and I arrived at the fairgrounds on the morning of the first day there were camera crews, photographers and journalists from all over the world. Add to that the advent of FM radio; and the following year Rolling Stone Magazine…Rock ‘n’ Roll was here to stay. Monterey gave birth to the first rock charity Monterey International Pop Festival Foundation, which continues to fund worthwhile causes in the names of the artists who appeared at Monterey. Precedents and prerequisites would be set for future concerts and festivals, including the overall treatment of the artist…Derek Taylor’s handling of the press…Chip Monks’ sound and lights…Pennebaker’s groundbreaking movie “Monterey Pop. The true legacy of The Monterey International Pop Festival is not the crowd size…not the weather…not a violent incident…it is the music. The groundbreaking artists who were introduced (Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, and The Who) and the “rock royalty” (Simon & Garfunkel, Otis Redding and The Mamas & The Papas) that performed there continue to be revered and continue to impact to this day the music and musicians who came after it happened in Monterey on June 16, 17, and 18, 1967.
Customer Reviews
I have to play a disc from Netflix to Blu-Ray. This is awesome at all levels. If you read the Criterion Collection Essays [...], you'll see that most of the cast was just experimenting with the new form - Rock and Roll - because most of the actors (Mamas and Papas, Janis Joplin and others) was released in right and were strongly influenced by the movement of folk, blues and jazz, of course. The result was simply magical at all levels. Check the setlist. Check the artist.To see Hendrix perform The Troggs "Wild Thing" and then with his guitar on fire for the love of light, it was incredible. To understand that, before the concert that Hendrix, a stranger who had ridden the Chitlin Circuit 'for years, a guitar god is difficult, given the reputation he has built for himself converted to imagine in the next three years to get his life was before it was interrupted by Herion addiction. The same was true with Janis Joplin. To see Who's bashapart from their instruments was their way of performing art destructive, a concept I do not understand intellectually but emotionally, it is not important - that the world was 40 years ago, on a world whose innocence we have in some way affect everyone us, and when the 50s costumes were out the window and, since 1967 and the first rock festival, the death of JFK was omnipresent in the minds of young people and artists such as the growing U.S. involvement in Vietnam was and despite the PresidentNixon's attempts to control everything, since 1968, the Company was actually a win and the music, be relevant as never before or since, "continued the movement. Maybe it's Woodstock of 1969 was a great success. If it were not been to Monterey, there was Woodstock. Music has the power.
Blu-ray transfers are, in a word, perfect. The video is as clear as full of life, as you can imagine, and the audio is remastered in DTS HD Master Audio oneRevelation, and makes the whole experience that much more is available, who says that you can understand how you feel, even if the 16mm lens of the camera crew Pennebaker, a splendid job of filming not only the artists on stage but the artists themselves are sitting in the audience enjoy the music itself. This is a photo of Mama Cass to Janis Joplin singing "Ball and Chain" is priceless. As always, the camera man's attention to details like this that make little momentsin a movie even more special. I was horrified to learn, however, that the performance of the Grateful Dead was in fact one of his best performances to dance with all channels in the aisles. But no video. No sound. I'm going to get the second disc and when finances allow, it will become a valuable part of my collection of videos. I was only 6 for most of 1967, but for some reason feel a deep connection to this music. Perhaps because the crop of artists who have been hereAmerica then dominated popular music, many were. What has happened in pop music these days is just an insult to everyone that these are great musicians in their music, body and soul, things missing, unfortunately, today, when pop music is often there for the fame, not art done. This is art. Five stars. And if I could give six, I would. All I have to say is: enjoy.
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