The Great British Woodstock ─ The Incredible Story of the Weeley Festival 1971

It started as a donkey derby, a small local charity event, but when plans for the 1971 Isle of Wight Festival fell through, Clacton Round Table decided to hold a pop concert of their own. A small gig for 5,000 locals. Little did they know that it would become one of the biggest music festivals ever seen in the UK, drawing a crowd of over 150,000 people. The Weeley Festival of Progressive Music has since become part of British popular music folklore. Overwhelmed by the sheer number of those attending, ‘Weeley’ changed the future of how outdoor events are organized. Rock stars, including Rod Stewart and the Faces, Status Quo and T. Rex, accompanied by Hells Angels, a rural police force, local volunteers and a complete lack of proper planning, culminated in one of the most legendary festivals of all time. In The Great British Woodstock, this one-off event is remembered by all those who were there, in both unpublished interviews and photographs.

Ray Clark is a BBC Radio Essex presenter, and has over thirty years’ experience as a disc jockey. He broadcasted on Radio Caroline in the 1980s under the name Mick Williams, and is the author of Radio Caroline: The True Story of the Boat that Rocked (THP, 2014).