For
information on today's festivals see eFestivals.co.uk
The Archive.
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For
information on today's festivals see eFestivals.co.uk |
Updated Jan 2008-ticket scan .
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Reading August 24-26th 1973. |
5:30 Am Sunday Reading 1973 © Vin Miles |
Quadrille onstage 1973 © photos Steve Austin |
This line-up featured a fair percentage of acts that had been at the 1971/72 festivals .But the re-emergence of jazz , in the form of art critic George Melly and old regular Chris Barber , was somewhat surprising. There was also a fair percentage of folk orientated acts such as Richard and Linda Thompson and surprisingly few hard rock /blues acts ,which had always been a staple of the festival line-up. A number of acts (as usual )did not perform and others were substituted , if you have any info regarding this please let us know so we can be as accurate as possible and amend the lists. |
1973
festival Line-up
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Stackridge Reading 73 © Steve Austin |
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Reading Festival
by Michael Wale
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Early Sunday morning © Vin Miles |
Geordies around the campfire early hours of Sunday morning © Vin Miles |
| In 1973 I was 19 and already a veteran of several rock concerts. Here's what I wrote in my diary for Saturday, 25th August: "At 6pm I packed 3 hardboiled eggs, 3 slices of bread and 3 Dairylea cheese triangles, a sweater, an anorak, an electronic flash, 200mm telephoto lens,x3 tele-converter, took lots of money, and set off for the Reading Jazz, Blues and RockFestival. I got a lift from Bracknell to Woodley and then in a Jaguar 3.4 to v. near the festival site. It was a lovely sunny evening. I paid £2.50 to get in. It was packed! (I had been ready to be turned away.) I saw the Alex Harvey Band, Strider, Status Quo and Andy Bown. Alex was fun, Quo were fun and Bown was shit. I had worked my way up against the barriers at the front, same place as last year, so I had a very oblique sight of the stage from the right as I looked. The Faces came on about 11 and were v. popular. I took a fair number of pix of Rod the Mod in his yellow satin and tartan, as he twirled the mike stand around. People fainted at the barrier. Mick Jagger did not appear, as was rumoured. It was possibly the Faces' last British gig. They finished at 12.10 and then everyone lit fires in the arena. I spent the whole night either sitting around lovely fires among a sea of beer and Coke cans, or wandering about looking for a warm, dry place to sleep and buying Salvation Army soup. |
R.I.P Alex Harvey -truly one of the greats ©Vin Miles |
Survivors, early Sunday morning .....© Vin Miles |
Security blokes were putting out fires but about two survived all night. The dew came down heavily and I eventually lay down by a nice fire at 4.30am and tried to sleep. Someone sat between me and the fire and I got v. cold. At 5.30 it was getting light (or grey) so I got up, got warm again and then went off photographing the waking fans as the sun came up. I found 3 nice badges,and a pile of love-letters in a bin. I left on the train at 9.30am. A nice night and morning, if v.uncomfortable."
Vin Miles
I was at the 1973 festival in Reading. It's funny to look back on the list of performers nearly 30 years later and see who I didn't pay any attention at the time, e.g. Richard and Linda Thompson.
Quadrille © Steve Austin
You list Roy Buchanan among the performers.
He was in the original line-up but didn't show. I was really keen on seeing
him at the time. (He was billed as the world's greatest unknown guitarist.)
In fact, that was the deciding point in my getting a ticket. So I was very disappointed
to show up and learn he had pulled out for whatever reasons and was being replaced
by an older black American blues singer in that Sunday evening slot. It was
one of the Jimmies, either Jimmy Witherspoon or Jimmy Rushing. (I'm fairly sure
it was Witherspoon.) As a consolation, a then-young Robben Ford was the guitarist
in his band that evening.
I remember Jon Hiseman playing Saturday afternoon -- I seem to recall his band was Colosseum but I am probably compressing memories -- and he went into a LONG drum solo that after five minutes or so had everyone bored stiff. Someone in the middle of the crowd started building a tower out of empty 2-litre beer tins. It got fairly high up in the air before finally toppling to great cheers. Hiseman must have thought they were cheering for him because he just kept on going at his drum kit. I don't know what sort of detail you're looking for but here's what I recall. The headliner for Friday night was Rory Gallagher, with Commander Cody and his Lost Planet Airmen warming up. Though Hawkwind is not on your list of performers I'm 99% certain they played earlier that evening. Saturday night's headliner was The Faces (with a Japanese bass player who was playing facing deportation; that was the cause celebre of the weekend). As your reviewers point out it was a somewhat stale performance. Rod Stewart was decked out in tartan and kicking soccer balls out to the crowd but it was anti-climatic. Status Quo, who'd opened for them, got a better reception. I think the crowd was just plain tired out by that point. The gates had opened around noon and the Faces didn't come on till 11 p.m. John Martyn and Tim Hardin were among the folky early afternoon performers and put on strong shows. |
Rod de Mod © Vin Miles |
By
Sunday I had had festival overload and can't remember much of the afternoon.
Spencer Davis (with Peter York, not Peter Tork, as the program said) came on
about 7 p.m. followed by Jimmy Witherspoon. I can't remember who the warmup
to Genesis was, but Genesis, with Peter Gabriel, were the Sunday headliners.
Lots of props like pyramids dropping out of the sky, etc.
I don't know if this is of any help to you with your site. If it is, all the
best,
Cheers
David Henderson
Trapeze onstage © Steve Austin Nick Black remembers Here's
my recollection of the Reading festival in 1973.. yes it was held over
a bank holiday, and yes, too, by the time the festival was in full swing
it was clearly evident that the hippie dream was well and truly done
and dusted. Hawkwind never did play - wish they had. Commander Cody
(reason I went) did well in a high profile but ultimately unsuccessful
bid to break through to UK acceptance.They did a killer version of "smoke
smoke smoke (that cigarette)."
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There was some ugly violence, led by this huge ginger haired guy in the crowd, I think during Rory "man of the people" Gallagher, whose power was briefly cut midway during a song.Of course he went on playing. And I remember another incident, sign of the times, when some gentle long haired guy got up to sway naked in the crowd only to be the recipient of bottle after bottle. I remember John Martyn, and a whole host of now vanished wannabes. Alex Harvey went down a storm. But when Rod Stewart appeared with The Faces there seemed to appear from nowhere this crowd of hooligans waving football scarves, crowding in front of the stage like an army. "Am I losing you?" I remember Rod asking. |
The late great Alex Harvey © Vin Miles |
Weather
was fine, the whole place fenced, regulated, homogenised, and I remember John
Peel playing with breathless wonder the just released stones single "Angie".
I went with a friend who was paranoid about being caught smoking substances
in public. When I lit up, he scuttled like a crab about twenty feet forward.
Oh, another thing. in a bizarre way I think the first band on, a now forgotten
German group were by far and away the best there! They announced in heavy Germanic
tones "Ve haf just come bak from living in Morocco" and played what
I guess would sound very much like world music nowadays. They were met by silence
and me, noisily clapping.
Nick Black
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Reading 1973 © Vin Miles |
I
was privileged to be at the 1973 Reading event, and managed to sneak back
stage on the Saturday When I looked arround there was a man lying face down in front of me .When I helped him up to his feet I looked in amazement ,it was Keith Moon who was very drunk , holding a half full bottle of whisky, I had just picked Keith Moon up from the floor ! Then all hell broke loose and the whisky ended up though the window of a caravan of a music company who were there , possibly recording the event . Thrown by Mr Moon of course.
Dave Mccann |
Junk food at dawn, yum,yum ! © Vin Miles |
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Rod pix © Vin Miles
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The early festivals.
You can find out the complete
line ups of the first festivals if you follow the links below ,as well as new
information recently received in 2004 .
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Festivals 65-83
Most of these have fairly complete documentation .But new contributions of any sort are always welcome regarding any of the festivals.
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