Rock & Roll Photographer Describes Unforgettable Meeting Of The Tribes During The Summer Of Love
In the Summer of 1967, Tom Gundelfinger O’Neal was in his early 20s, a fine arts major fresh out of college. He was just Tom Gundelfinger back then, several years from adding his wife Mollie’s last name to his own. By chance, he scored a press pass to photograph the Monterey Pop Festival that June. It was an experience that would change his life.
“I was a fly on the wall,” he tells The Buzz. “I didn’t know the stars. I had this little Pentex 35 and didn’t completely know how to use it. But by the time the festival was over, I knew I wanted to be a rock and roll photographer.”
The Popfest, Tom says, was a meeting of the tribes. “It was really an international festival because Ravi Shankar was there, along with The Who and other bands from Britain. But it was also the first time the San Francisco bands got together with the Los Angeles bands. ”
Tom says you could tell the SF bands from the LA ones by the way they dressed. “The San Francisco groups were more into the counterculture tie-dye look. But the people coming from LA had that shiny hippy look, the kind of stuff you’d buy at the hippie boutiques in Beverly Hills and along the Sunset Strip. Chet Helms, a promoter of concerts and light shows in San Francisco, was dressed all in furs like someone out of “Game of Thrones.” Country Joe had on face paint and some kind of helmet. Brian Jones, from the Rolling Stones, was there in this lacy outfit that looked it came from a little old ladies dress shop.”
Legendary producer Lou Adler and John Phillips of the Mamas & The Papas were the major organizers of the festival and looked the part. “Adler had on a Panama hat and bell-bottoms with a wide plastic belt,” Tom recalls. “John Phillips had on this big fur hat.”
Monterey Pop was ground-breaking in more ways than one. “Adler and Phillips wanted to make it a great experience for the musicians,” O’Neal says. “There was a 24-hour kitchen serving steak and lobster all night. The sound system was one of the best ever. And D.A. Pennebaker was filming the whole thing, using the newest, state-of-the-art cameras and recording equipment.”
Tom says that Monterey, a 3-day event which took place June 16-18, 1967, inspired many other rock fests around the world. “It was the first event of its kind, music, love, flowers,” he explains. “Monterey was about the music. Woodstock was more about the weather. Coachella today, so huge, also takes its template from Monterey.” But not its ticket prices. “Day tickets to Monterey were $6.50 and that included a seat.”
The Popfest came close to not happening at all. “Monterey was very conservative back then, and the city fathers were afraid a stampede of hippies was going to take over the city,” Tom says. “So John Phillips wrote the famous song about going to San Francisco and wearing flowers in your hair, and had Scott McKenzie record it. They got it out three weeks before the festival and it had an effect. By the second day of the fest, the police presence was cut in half. There were pictures of officers weaving daisy chains. Everybody got it.”
All the musicians except Ravi Shankar performed for free, after funding from ABC fell through. “It was supposed to be a TV special, but the execs freaked out,” Tom says. Instead, Adler and Phillips created the non-profit Monterey International Pop Foundation dedicated to funding music education and other music related causes, which continues to operate today.
Tom Gundelfinger witnessed and photographed some amazing music that weekend. “The highlights for me were Janis Joplin and Otis Redding,” he says looking back. “Country Joe, Jefferson Airplane, The Byrds, The Grateful Dead, The Who, The Association, they were all great. Neil Young had just dropped out of Buffalo Springfield, so David Crosby filled in for him, which sort of irritated The Byrds, because he was playing with them then.”
And then there was Jimi Hendrix, making his first major appearance in the United States. “No one had ever performed like Hendrix did that day,” Tom says. “He gets down on his knees and is banging his guitar on the ground. Then he lays his guitar down and sets it on fire like a sacrifice to the gods of music. The feedback is so loud. There’s pandemonium on stage. It was so amazing, so dynamic, so exciting… and so hard to shoot.”
Tom found himself with a bad angle to catch Hendrix’s fiery finale, off to one side of the stage, but another photographer, Ed Caraeff, was luckier. “He managed to stand up on a chair so he was on the same level as Hendrix on that 7-foot high stage, and caught Jimi just as he leaned back from the flames. And it was literally a miracle that Ed got that shot,” Tom says. “He told me he was using Kodak film with just 36 frames on the roll. This was the 37th frame.”
O’Neal says he was 15 feet from fame that night, but nevertheless, covering Monterey launched his career as a rock photographer. His credits include over 80 album covers, including Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young’s iconic “Deja Vu,” and nine covers for Steppenwolf. He collaborated with many other artists including Joni Mitchell, the Rolling Stones, B.B. King, John Phillips, and The Mamas & The Papas. Tom is currently at work on a retrospective of his career, titled “Gundelfinger: Monterey Pop to Deja Vu and Beyond.”
While much has changed in the ensuing 50 years, the Monterey Fairgrounds where the Popfest was held is just the same, Tom says. This year, the Monterey International Pop Festival 50 returns for its 2nd edition, on the same dates as 50 years ago, June 16-18, 2017. This time Monterey is embracing the festival.
“Lou Adler gave Monterey the festival name, which makes it all possible,” Tom says. He hopes to see Monterey Pop become an annual event, joining the Monterey Jazz Festival, the Cali Roots Festival and other musical events at the Fairgrounds.
Most of all Tom hopes this year’s festival can capture the spirit of 50 years ago. “There was a moment on the second day, when this feeling came over me of being so completely happy, so warm and loving. Lots of people felt that way at Monterey. It was a wonderful experience.”
Renee Wright
A graduate of Franconia College in Social Psychology, Renee has worked as Travel Editor for Charlotte Magazine and has written three travel guidebooks for Countryman Press among other writing assignments. She enjoys food and camping.
Make Sure To Stay At:
The Monterey County Fair & Event Center RV Park, offers RV parking in the heart of Monterey. It is conveniently nearby restaurants and shops, just blocks from the beach and the Monterey Bike Path and a few minutes’ drive from Downtown Monterey.