Sunday, April 6, 2014

The Day of Rest: The Woodstock of the West Coast

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It was forty years ago today. No, that's not the day that Sergeant Pepper taught the band to play. It was the day Southern California had it's own mammoth music festival, the California Jam.

Where the 10 and 15 freeways intersect today, on what is now covered by Ontario Mills Shopping Center and other various businesses, there was a large speedway. 


Ontario Motor Speeday had a track copied from Indy, a 2.5 mile rectangle with rounded corners. If you saw the old George Hamilton movie, 'Evel Knievel,' this was where the scenes regarding his big jump were filmed.


This was the location of the California Jam. I wasn't there, I was only 12 at the time, but I do remember it. It was shown on TV and that day, we were driving along the San Bernardino Freeway (Interstate 10) to my grandmother's house and I remember it was so crowded that people just parked there cars over the first couple of lanes of freeway and walked in from there.


Must've been a hell of a show.


Here are a few highights...


Let's start with a very, very young Ozzy Osbourne leading Black Sabbath in a rendition of 'War Pigs.'





Let's move on to the Eagles remembering that time they stood on the corner in Winsow, Arizona.





Rare Earth just wants to celebrate.





Not this day, but one of the craziest, rowdiest concerts I ever attended in my life was headlined by Jim Dandy and Black Oak Arkansas.


For many people that day, the highlight was this performance of 'Smoke on the Water."



A lot more people thought that the big highlight was Keith Emerson taking flight with his piano.



We'll leave you with this version of Karn Evil 9 from the Jam...


Darryl

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