DESCRIPTION:
I'd been engineering for Bernie Worrell & the Woo Warriors for the last 3 years or so, and when you work with him, you never know who or what is going to effect your life. On every gig you never know who is going to turn up for a guest appearance.

One night at the Wetlands, Stanley Jordan showed up and we had a Killer Night.

Well, on one of our last times out Bernie tells me there is a chance of doing Woodstock.

Well, I guess things fell into place and I found myself Trucking to Woodstock with Bernie, his wife, Michael (Moon) Reuben, Gabe "Undi$co Kidd" Gonzalez, Donna McPherson, Dawn Silva (one of the Brides of Funkenstein), Steve Scales, and Amp Fiedler. Later, Catherine Russell joined us up there for the Big Show at the west stage.

We had been told we would be playing at George Clinton's Birthday Party, and Bootsy was going to be playing at it too.

I had visions of our Ford van turning into a VW Micro Bus at any second along the way. We didn't hit much traffic as the party was on thursday and we had left very early at 6:00 am.

When we got to the hotel it was like old home week meeting all the faces I had met touring with Bernie. A lot of the old and new P-Funk people were staying at the same hotel. I was introduced to some of the old Funkadelic members along the way. I wish I could remember all the names right now but, I just had a killer day and the brains are still fried from the weekend...

I was told that a little of Funk History was going to be made as it would be the first time in years that all three of the Funk Masters would appear on the same stage since the old days. Imagine Bernie, Bootsy, and George together again!!! We were all very excited!!!

I got my first taste of the scope of things when we took off from the hotel following secret directions that would take us up to a check point where we would be escorted to the site of the Birthday party. We had found our way down country roads coming to blocked intersections where
there would be state troopers checking ID's.

When they saw we were appearing artists, they waved us through, and blocked off traffic from the road we went down. I never saw that many troopers and rolling parking lots in my life!!!

We had finally arrived at a small airport where we would pickup our escort to the secret birthday party location. After another hour on the road, we arrived at the site of the Woodstock Concert site, and followed our escort through more check points than you can imagine. Cars, tour
buses, trailers, equipment trucks, and people walking all over the place. It was then that the magnitude of things started to hit us!!!!!!

I have been on large tours before in my past, but this one was different. There was a vibe in the air that was different!!!! It was an Electric Excitement!!!!

After we got all the laminates and some food, we went off to the P-Funk dressing rooms to stow our duds. I had gone through all the Huggs and ^5's with everyone and I had to get to work. I had to hook up with the P-Funk crew and work things out with their FOH engineer and work out all the details of our line lists and stage plot for our segment of the birthday show.

God there was the biggest stage, sound system,
lighting, the Mother Ship, etc,... than I'd ever seen. Bigger then some of the sheds that I had been at on tours, and this was in Hanger 100.

After a late start, I mixed Bernie & the Woo Warriors as they opened the birthday party.

When we were done, P-Funk came out, and George Clinton turned on the Funk. Later on Bootsy came on and that 15Kw was smokin the bottom end!!!!!!!!! God what a night!!!!!

What a Birthday Party!!!!

The next day on the West Stage, George Clinton fired up P-Funk, Bootsy Funked the Bass, Bernie Funked the keys, and the rest is Funk History!

Later on, back at the dressing rooms we started to hear some of the stories of the $6.00 soda. The $4.00 bottle of water. The $30.00 sandwich.

I don't get it. I really Don't.

It seems the Woodstock 69 was the Happening of the Hippy, and Woodstock 99 was the happening of the Yuppie!!!!! Hippies don't riot, rampage, and set fires!!!

One guy got busted later on with $16,000.00 on him for selling mushrooms. Now that's a Yuppie!!!!

My life is Music, and I was there for the Music. I would like to believe that everyone was there for just the Music. But somehow, I doubt it!!!

I have come to believe, you can't repeat an instantaneous thing Twice!

Wookstock 69 was about peace, love, and music.

Woodstock 99 was about something a lot different.

I was really blessed to be with the few people who played the real music at this 1999 musical event, and made Funk History.

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