Ono & Lennon's Quit Peace Fest

Onolennons Quit Peace Fest

John Lennon and Yoko Ono have officially withdrawn from the Mosport Peace Festival. The Onolennons sent the festival’s promoters a telegram of withdrawal on March 12th which read; “Just read your report. Have done exactly what we told you not to. We set it up to be free. We want nothing to do with you or yourYestival. Please do not use our names or our ideas or symbols, (signed) J ohn and Yoko Lennon.”

Lennon said later that week that he had “never committed himself’ to the festival. Brower issued a statement which read; “John and Yoko now want the festival to be completely free. While we agree with the intent we are reluctant to accept the responsibility of another Altamont.”

“I feel that a free festival would be an incredible catastrophe,” Brower continued. He also claimed that the Canadian government would neither condone or permit a festival of that magnitude.

However, the original plan, that 50% of the gross would go to the Onolennon peace fund, would have been supported by the Canadian government; they would have chipped in for 50% of the expenses. (It’s unclear why Canada didn’t,, or doesn’t, just donate that amount to the fund; probably has something todo with free enterprise.)

Furthermore, Lennon had insisted that the price .of the festival be reduced; the price was already at a “low” $10 which, though it looks steep, is quite reasonable since it includes meals (hope you like brown rice).

The first acts for the festival were booked this week but the site is still uncertain. Mosport Park was refused by the town council. The site had originally been iapproved, according to our sources, because Brower’s people own the racetrack and it’s the city’s sole source of revenue.

The conceptions of the festival are still Lennon’s however; he was asked to do it by Hugh Khoury (pronounced Curry) of Karma Productions in Toronto (Khoury had the poster concession at the first Toronto festival) but the conceptions were John’s alone. The telegram apparently leaves the festival conceptually deficient and rather directionless.

It was Lennon, they say, who picked Brower as a promoter over Brower’s partner, Ken Walker. (They had produced the first two pop fests in Toronto including the Rock and Roll Revival, in which John and Yoko made their initial live Plastic Ono Band appearance.)

The reason that they lost the racetrack ties in with Lennon’s comment last week that he “resented” attempts by Brower to blame festival problems on his business manager Allen Klein. Our sources contend that Walker, cheesed at not being chosen along with/instead of Brower, got hold of Klein and claimed that the whole thing was going on in order to woo the managership of the Beatles to festival bigwigs Brower, Shep Gordon (Alice Cooper’s manager) and their cohorts/"

Klein is said to have believed the tale (though Lennon’s comments make that doubtful) because his contract with the Fab Four runs out at the end of the year. However, our sources maintain that that part of the story is bullshit anyway because all the festival promoters are interested in is the $10 million dollars they stand to make from a successful bash.

Walker, on the other hand, is supposed to be doing the so-called Train Festival, to be performed five days before and five days after the Peace Festival; it’ll be a train with the acts and stuff travelling across Canada from Montreal to Vancouver with key stops, including Toronto, in between. The Train Festival is being co-promoted by Roland Paquin and David Williams. The way things stand now bands who appeared at one festival would presumably not be. allowed to perform at the other.

But the most recent rumors have the Train Festival moved up to mid-June because of the gigantic degree of publicity the Peace Festival has garnered.

The bands to be presented at the fest are to have “100% positive” vibes. Thus, groups like the MC5, Stooges and Doors are almost definitely ruled out. Alice Cooper might be rationalized in, though, because they’re one of Lennon’s favorites; on top of that, they haven’t murdered a chicken in four months.

As for the Rolling Stones, they’re apparently unwelcome, too. The promoters feel that, given Altamont, their performance could only be both “anticlimatic“ and “negative”.

The outlook, say those who know, is “bumpy” but if the festival goes on it should look something like this:

The bands will be housed on a sixty acre farm nearby, with closed circuit tv viewing the performance site. There will be 13 stages at the festival site; the major stage will have a sound system large enough to reach 750,000 fans. But, since they obviously aren’t all going to be able to see all the stage, closed circuit tv and “immediate sound” boxes will be provided in the audience area. The 20 “major” bands to appear at Mosport will be presented on the stage.

Rock and roll will be presented on 2 other, minor, stages with sound systems of the “Madison Square Garden” size. The other stages will feature peace speakers and other luminaries, notably the eminent Canadian media theorist Marshall McLuhan. It’ll be a total festival, they isay: not all rock acts.

The promotional budget is, of course, nil. What with the huge amount of speculation concerning Lennon and the Beatles and the very outlandish nature of the Proposals (or some of them) concerning the festival, press coverage is high: higher than that which precipetated Woodstock.

Dave Marsh