Hendrix’s guitar ended up at the tip after ‘first rock festival’
Harry Parkhill & Karl Bird
BBC News
BBC/Karl Bird
The 1967 Monterey Pop Festival in the US is often cited as having been the first rock festival. But weeks earlier, thousands of fans crowded round a shed in Lincolnshire to watch some of music’s biggest names perform.
“What you’ve got to remember is this was a shed,” says record shop owner Alan Barnsdale, recalling the Tulip Bulb Auction Hall in Spalding, Lincolnshire.
“It was an auction house for selling off [flower] bulbs and commodities like that. No windows. There was nothing there.”
And yet, on Monday 29 May 1967, history was made when the likes of Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Pink Floyd and The Move performed there to eager fans.
By luck or foresight, Barbeque 67 set the tone for what was to come.
“[It] was the first British rock festival, really, although nobody knew it was at the time,” says Bev Bevan, the drummer from Electric Light Orchestra and The Move.
“It was groundbreaking.”
Svenska Dagbladet AFP via Getty Images
Hendrix was among the attractions, but the day did not go too well for the legendary guitarist.
“He was not happy with the sound at all,” remembers Bev. “He just couldn’t get his guitar to sound like he wanted it to.”
Local historian Doug Kendall was in the crowd that day.
“I think it was possibly the only time in history that Hendrix was heckled,” he says.
Also on the line-up was Sounds Force Five. Drummer Colin Ward remembers the young guitarist kicking his amplifiers before taking his frustration one step further.
“He set fire to his guitar with lighter fuel, which was quite funny at the time, and then he threw that off stage,” Colin recalls.
“Sadly, that guitar ended up on the council tip. Had we had the foresight of keeping it, it would be worth thousands now.”
It was a gimmick Hendrix repeated to great acclaim the following month at the Monterey Pop Festival, which is widely regarded as launching his career in the US.
Hendrix and his frustration was just one of many odd moments at this curious festival.
Pink Floyd played to only a few hundred people, because there were too few turnstiles to allow the thousands of fans inside in time to see their set.
Later, there were so many people in the auction room that punters were pushed under the stage and watched through cracks in the floorboards.
And on the night of the gig, Hendrix was reported to have attracted the attention of plenty of adoring female fans outside his hotel window.
But its quirkiness was a product of the fact that nobody had done it before.
“It was one of the best festivals I ever did and the people running that festival… had it down, man. It was fantastic,” singer Geno Washington says.
Washington and his Ram Jam Band headlined the gig and it is one he still remembers fondly.
“I can’t see why they didn’t do it again because it was huge, man,” Geno adds.
‘It was overshadowed’
It is believed the festival attracted a crowd of between 4,000 and 6,000, and there were many more outside unable to gain entry.
However, despite its popularity on the day, it didn’t make that many headlines due to the release of an iconic Beatles album the Friday before the event.
“Sgt Pepper was released and it took over the rock press,” Doug recalls.
“So, a little event in Spalding didn’t raise the same interest.
“I think that it’s something that needs publicity because not many people actually knew, even at the time, that it took place.”
The auction room was eventually demolished and the area is now occupied by Halfords and Argos.
On the streets of Spalding today, most people have never heard of Barbeque 67.
One person asks if it is a “kind of sauce”, another wonders if it is an “American barbecue” and one asks if it is a “kind of restaurant”.
Despite a Blue Plaque marking the hotel where Hendrix stayed, many people in the town have no idea of the musical heritage on their doorstep or whose guitar might be languishing at the bottom of a nearby landfill site.
