The Archive. 

The Knebworth Park Festivals.

6-24-78.

Genesis,Jefferson Starship,Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Devo, Brand X, Roy Harper , Atlanta Rhythm Section.

The view from the mud.

Recollections of festival attendees .

A view of the crowd at Knebworth 1978, if you spot youself, please let us know :-)

Martin, who took the two photos above , has this recollection .

I actually didn't go to see Frank at Knebworth, as I decided after going to see the Starship at the June 78 Knebworth show that I had had enough of big gigs like that (and anyway, I'd seen Frank twice already that year). I had always been a huge Airplane/early Starship fan, but it was a very disappointing show; Grace Slick had fallen out (again!) with the band in Germany the previous week and flown back to America, so they played without her (I never ever got to see her, nor did I ever see the Dead either btw), and the sound simply wasn't loud enough. It was a windy day, and the music just drifted away with the wind............. as you can see from the photos we were some way back from the stage. I remember absolutely nothing about Genesis' set .........in fact until I checked your site I couldn't even remember who headlined that day! Anyway, I had given up on them after Gabriel left, so I really wasn't very interested.

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Roy Harper was for me the star of Knebworth 78.

Jefferson Starship take off . Knebworth 1978 © Leigh Revell

 I went to see Jefferson Starship on their only UK trip and Grace didn’t show due to a big fallout I think in Germany.  The band played pride of Man the old Quicksilver track, but frankly were shambolic  and unbalanced.  Only wooden ships was up to standard.  Genesis were superb playing in the fading summer light into the darkness but the unsung heroes for me were Tom Petty with some good straight uncomplicated rock and Harper who was the filler through the day.
 
Harper and his quintessential Englishness was the perfect backdrop for this festival.  In fact his unheralded performances were a delightful surprise and captured the mood of the day perfectly, especially with One of Those Days In England.
 
I had seen Harper 5 years previously, in fact he played my school, Repton.  I wondered what the fuss was about, but on this day and in this setting he was magical.
 
Bill Sowerbutts

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© Leigh Revell

 

hey, great stuff on your site...i was in the us air force and went to this concert....saw a clip on the tube about genisis and they flashed to knebworth and was looking for a poster from this concert...i was by the american flag you see in the pics on your site....was one of the best concerts i've ever been too.....we were so wiped out after could not even find the parking lot we parked in until the next morning...awesome tunes for sure every band there that day rocked...even starship......knebworth was really a fantastic concert and partying with the brits was the greatest...memories for a lifetime that day!
Thanks, Jim Pickles

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I lived 6 miles from Knebworth and always felt it was a bit jammy that we lived so close.In some ways I envied people who'd hitch-hiked down from Scotland or Europe, it was too cosy. On this particular day (my second Knebworth after the Stones in '76) my mate Gerry and I got a lift to the Festival site I'm slightly ashamed to say, by my Dad and his mate George who'd travelled down from Banbury with his son and his pal, who were only 16- I was 19 at the time. So there were 4 of us.There must have been 50,000 plus there but it was a nice manageable crowd unlike the Stones or Led Zeppelin.
I must confess the Atlanta Rhythm Section and Brand X went on a bit- Now I'm older I might appreciate them more but jazz rock noodlings at lunchtime is not going to work- you sometimes wonder who puts these bills together. Phil Collins played drums with Brand X I think, that's how the bill gets put together.
I thought Devo were great- the boring Prog Rock audience threw stuff at them as I remember, which they probably enjoyed as part of the theatre, but it showed where the OGWT mentality was, at the time,Are We Not Men We are Devo, dressed up as flowerpots or something- what's not to like?
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, as a result of shows like this, were actually bigger here than in the USA. A stunning set, I think Tom wore a top hat and they played truly great songs like Breakdown, American Girl and Listen to Her Heart-Mike Campbell on guitar was fantastic and the audience definitely got it. I saw them 2 years later on the Damn the Torpedoes Tour at Hammersmith Odeon when they became massive.
Can't remember too much about the day although I met a nice girl called Cara from London, we corresponded for a while-then she moved to Canada...
As other folks have pointed out, it was a big disappointment that Grace Slick had left the band in Germany under a cloud(She's sung in this country just a few times I believe) but I enjoyed the Starship's AOR , really liked Marty Balins voice on songs like Miracles.
The only Genesis lp I own is still Trick of the Tail and I'm pleased to say they played a chunk of it in their set, Squonk, Ripples , songs like that- the light show was grand and it was a stirring, uplifting performance with the much maligned Phil Collins in top form. These festivals were fantastic-not always the best scenario in which to listen/watch live music but I only have good memories of these occasions, being able to take your own snacks/beer in , meet people and enjoy the live fare for a relatively cheap price and have priceless memories 30 years on.

Pete Wyatt

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That summer I went again to Knebworth for both the Genesis and Zappa concerts. The Genesis set was truly scary. In the middle of 150,000 middle-aged, middle-class, middle-middle fans all singing along with every word. Seeing as I'd seen them in the days of Trespass and Nursery Cryme when Peter Gabriel (A Flower ?) and the band were actually interesting, this was a huge turn off. Much more fun were Devo, although the crowd didn't think so and pelted them with cans.

Julian Bond

Noted cartoonist Hunt Emerson's take on Knebworth was , as usual, pretty hilarious

© Hunt Emerson

Used with kind permission from Hunt Emerson who wrote :

I'm delighted that you want to use my strip from all those years ago - I just went and had another look at it. I was a grumpy sod back then...
Please take this as my permission, and go now in peace.
All the best

HUNT

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I went to the Genesis show in 1978 mainly to see Devo. A group of us dressed up in boiler suits, skateboard helmets and chlorine goggles and went down to the front of the stage and just looned around. The crowd had been pretty laid back up til that point, but as soon as Devo went on stage, previously comatose hippies started raging and swearing and throwing things at them. Devo seemed to positively thrive on it.

A little while later I went with the same group of friends to see Devo play at Hammersmith Odeon (can’t quite remember when). We were hanging around after the show and Mark Mothersbaugh came on stage to collect his Wasp (a little portable keyboard). We bounced over to him and my mate (who called himself The Great Nelkimbo) showed Mothersbaugh his customised T-shirt with the legend “Hopelessly Devo-ted to you” on it. Mothersbaugh loved it and swapped it for one of the yellow jump suits the band wear at the beginning of their set. Then he looked at us and said "hey – you’re the guys who were freaking out at Knebworth aren’t you?" Since then I have gone on to get a masters degree in philosophy, speak in the European Parliament and witness the birth of my daughter. But to this day, that exchange with Mark Mothersbaugh remains my proudest moment.

Ray Symons.

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Genesis 1978
I remember this for good organisation and sound quality (throughout). Genesis put on a high quality show (playing, light show, sound) that was however as usual a bit low on passion. Strangely I saw pretty much the same line up 30 years later at the HSBC Arena in Buffalo, NY, USA and the 2 shows were equally professional. Collins' voice held up well too. The Knebworth crowd were still hankering after Gabriel as I recall.
Jefferson Starship were excellent and this provoked a lifelong interest in them and Airplane for me. I was too far back to see the bottling of Devo - who actually played extremely well.
Overall very memorable - just 16 yrs old crashing in a field - quite a "civilised" festival, in line with its Midsummer Nights Dream theme.

Chirs Davies

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We are short on recollections , can you help ?

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