
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, August 17, 1994                   TAG: 9409290007
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A10   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

GENERATIONS

THE RAIN was a nice touch, at least for those of us who were sitting high and dry, watching Woodstock '94 as a news story and comparing it to the original of 25 years ago.

The mud - generating, of course, the mud people, who abandoned themselves to the ooze and wallowed - was the most notable similarity, if for no other reason than it wasn't, couldn't be, staged. But there were others: some drugs, some nekkidness, the spiritual presence of Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin, who flamed out much too early to see a 25th anniversary of anything. And there were the still-alive, still-memorable, performances of some of the musicians who had appeared at Woodstock '69, and of Bob Dylan, who had not.

But this was Woodstock Nation: The Next Generation, aimed at, and attracting, hundreds of thousands of young people who either hadn't been born or were too young to attend when the original music festival became a cultural landmark in their parents' lives.

And for a Generation X that has defined itself (or been defined) mainly by its complaints that it hasn't been able to establish its own foothold for all the dust kicked up by the colossal baby-boom herd ahead of it, there was more than a little irony in the whole concept. Would the same cultural cohesion, a sort of generational gelling, occur with a musical updating of what Green Day's Billie Joe spoke of as that "peace-love hippie bullFor a generation that, more than anything, has sought to distinguish itself from the overbearing boomers?

It hardly seems likely. Though the corporate sponsors - yeah, corporate sponsors - are really hoping it will be so. The bigger it looms as an event, the more money to be made on CDs, videos and every imaginable marketing spin-off.

This Woodstock was not the Woodstock. The national turmoil that created such generational passion just doesn't exist, replaced by vitriolic sniping and voyeuristic spying on talk radio and TV. But it was a Woodstock for its time: a pay-per-view event, wired to the worldwide Internet, and attended live and in person by a new generation of rockers. With their moms and dads. Who brought along their cellular phones.

by CNB