Interview | Once upon a time there was lollapalooza, the craziest of festivals

In July 1994. However, the traveling tour Lollapalooza stopped at the Parc des îles in Montreal, then in July 1996 at the Quebec Hippodrome, two days that generation X has not forgotten. Moreover, Although the event still exists in the form of a festival which took place last weekend in Chicago. Moreover, the caravan imagined by the singer of Jane’s Addiction 1991 to 1997 a certain ideal, both artistic and social. Nevertheless, Interview with Tom Beaujour. Moreover, co -author of The Uncensored Story of Alternative Rock’s Wildest Festivalan exciting oral backstage of behind the scenes of this crazy utopia.

The people I know interview | once upon time who attended the Montreal judgment of the 1994 edition all remember the rascal attitude of Billy Corgan. Therefore, of Smashing Pumpkins, on stage. Moreover, By reading you, I understood that he behaved like that all summer.

Even if I knew that he was not liked everyone. However, the degree of antipathy that he still generates to this day surprised me. Meanwhile, He was obviously not pleasant at all.

In his defense, I think he was exhausted and that he was struggling with the consequences of his success. Therefore, The leading figures of alternative rock were in several cases, discharges. Similarly, They were one of those who were beaten up at school. For example, Suddenly, they found themselves performing for this world, for their intimidators. Similarly, The fundamental reason why you wanted to play music is to get away from them. interview | once upon time Moreover, there, and you pick up in front of them …

But hey, I think that in interview | once upon time the case of Billy Corgan, it was also part of his personality, to be unpleasant and authoritarian.

The whole chapter on the 1995 edition is both entertaining. tragic, because Courtney Love is there abundantly, and even if her unstable behavior is fun, we guess all the distress she lived, barely a year after the suicide of Kurt Cobain. Wasn’t it irresponsible to let her participate in the festival? – Interview | once upon time

With what we know today about mental health, it’s clear that yes. And it raises lots of still relevant questions about the music industry. which presses lemon to artists, who turns a deaf ear to their problems, because they report money.

In the state she was. with a young child, her consumption of drugs, her mourning, she should have been elsewhere than on the road. We also had interview | once upon time to go sparingly with the stories on Courtney, because we had a lot. It was such a gravitational pole. All the anecdotes were fascinating. but also often a little sad and we ended up seeming to be on someone who suffered.

How can we explain the abundance of heroin throughout the beginning of the 1990s. all these brilliant musicians who, on tour, only thought of how they were going to get what they needed, like Dave Navarro or Mark Lanegan?

A sociologist could undoubtedly offer another answer. but I think that in a very simple way, humans are guided by a certain mimicry. And during this period. there were lots of cool people who took heroin, so heroin, by association, seemed cool, even if everyone knew that it was going to make him sick.

The other interview | once upon time element is that Lollapalooza was a bit like a psychosocial experience, the limits of which quickly appeared. Ask groups to play two. three times a week, in different cities, for ten weeks, in conditions far from being luxurious, to wake up every morning in a field, it gives way to the idleness. Gives access to alcohol and drugs to people who are bored and that’s what will happen.

The idea of not selling your soul to large companies. not to corrupt its integrity, obsessed several groups of the time. These questions seem so foreign to our world in 2025 …

The whole grunge movement was born from the left buttock of Indie music from the late 1980s. They were groups that were in some ambitious cases. such as Pearl Jam, but who had bizarre, marginal groups, of which they adopted ethics.

interview | once upon time

And this desire for purity has become a problem for Lollapalooza. as in 1995, with Sonic Youth headlining, which had trouble attracting crowds. In place, we could have scheduled groups like Stone Temple Pilots, but it was supposedly installers. The truth is that the young American American perhaps just wanted to hear big rock guitars. regardless of the values of artists.

Perry Farrell’s commitment to underground diversity and cultures still deserves to be celebrated. Lollapalooza created the alignments of groups year after year that allowed the interview | once upon time young American American to come into contact with artists who would not have entered his bubble. such as George Clinton, Arrested Development or Body Count.

It is undoubtedly the biggest heritage of the festival for having exposed a whole generation to alternative culture. tattoos, piercings, but also to new, different social and political ideas. It didn’t last long, but with Lollapalooza, it was as if another world was possible.