Baba Ray Speaks. . . .

Ain't technology grand? Yes, being a 60s kind of guy, I resisted it at first, I admit. Yes, I clung to all those defensive Luddite notions of the superiority of the lead pencil and the IBM Selectric. But to hell with that. Once I realized what I really wanted--needed--HAD TO HAVE--was A WEB SITE, the walls came a-tumbling down. So: here we go. My soon-to-be pride & joy, ApplestockNation.com isn't quite up yet, but. . . stay tuned. When it goes live, it's going to be spectacular, and a powerful reminder of something the world has nearly forgotten: that the very first festival of rock 'n' roll was NOT Monterey Pop or Woodstock. . . but Applestock '66, and we should damn well know it and not forget it.

Not that I sit around all day thinking about Applestock. There's plenty else to occupy what remains of my mind. And anyway, I don't have to: there is a book now that promises to chronicle the whole thing. I say "promises"--actually, I shouldn't pretend that I haven't read it; I have, in manuscript. Author William McCranor Henderson has done the job. I can't really say that I come off looking all that good much of the time. No one can ever accuse me of commissioning a puff job. But it gets my blessing because it's basically honest, and vastly informative about what happened in Applestock, Maine, in 1966. Culturati take note: this is the one big story from the Sixties that has never been told before. Stand by. . . .