It was 1999. I was 16, still in high school, and the summer air was sticky and unrelenting. That year, my dad managed to score us passes to Woodstock ’99. He had friends in Rome, NY, where the festival was being held at the Griffiss Air Force Base, and we were lucky enough to snag tickets. What unfolded over those few chaotic days was something I’ll never forget—not just for the music, the mayhem, and the madness, but for the way it changed my life.
What stands out most vividly in my mind is seeing Korn perform. By the time their set began, night had fallen, and the atmosphere was electric. Thousands of people converged on the stage, a sea of bodies moving and pulsing like one living organism. My dad, who had no idea what he was walking into, looked absolutely stunned as the crowd erupted into chaos. It was a surreal experience, and for a teenager like me, it was pure adrenaline.
Back then, Woodstock ’99 was also broadcast on pay-per-view. My brother and I had a “hot box” (a cable box that unscrupulously unlocked all channels), and we recorded everything. Even though we were there in person, we couldn’t resist capturing it all to relive later. But before the festival descended into the infamous mayhem that would make headlines, another performance caught my attention—and it wasn’t Korn or any of the other big names I had expected.
Before Woodstock, I had seen a group of guys performing on TV wearing clown paint, throwing soda into the crowd. It had to be a few years earlier when I randomly stumbled upon an MTV documentary (Shocumentary). I didn’t know much about them then, but the imagery stuck with me—wild, chaotic, and completely unorthodox. Fast forward to Woodstock, and there they were again. My friend John Paul and I had been chatting on the phone earlier and instantly clicked when we realized we’d both spotted the same bizarre act.
“Did you see those guys performing in clown paint and throwing soda?” I asked him.
“Yeah, who the hell are they?” he shot back, as intrigued as I was.
That moment unraveled everything. I told John Paul what I had pieced together from that MTV documentary and a few scattered references I’d seen: these were Insane Clown Posse, and they were unlike anything I had ever encountered.
Their performance and the sheer audacity of their antics captured my imagination. They didn’t care about rules or fitting into a mold—they were unapologetically themselves, and that resonated with me in a way that nothing else had. From that point on, everything changed.
Woodstock ’99 may be remembered for its chaos, but for me, it was a turning point. I walked away with more than just memories of Korn or the heat or the insanity of the crowd—I walked away with a new perspective on music and self-expression, one that has stuck with me ever since.