Janis arrives at Woodstock ‘69

Speaking of Woodstock . . . 

Janis Joplin and her crew arrived at the Woodstock Festival by helicopter on August 16, 1969. They had to be picked up from their motel due to the huge traffic jam caused by the massive attendance at the festival. Janis felt dizzy and nervous seeing the huge number of people from the helicopter. Despite wanting to perform immediately, she had to wait for about 10 hours backstage and watch the performances with her partner Peggy Caserta before going on stage in the early hours of August 17.

 

I mean you knew Janis swung both ways right? . . . .not really a confirmed out n out lesbian but definitely bi-sexual she was in a strong relationship with Peggy Caserta seen here at their arrival at the festival. It is said Caserta was also a dope dealer but I have my doubts the biography Going Down with Janis, I have mentioned before and it is largely rubbish but that Caserta was a confirmed gay woman is a given and Janis’ predilection for mixing it up with men as well drove the relationship with Peggy to a final end, sadly ending in Janis death and Caserta’s addiction  issues (the reason for the dreadful book) . . . .a sad story but these were happier times! 

Aaaah Woodstock!

Let your Freak Flag Fly!

Janis in Record Mirror 1969 +

Janis Joplin at the Hotel Chelsea in New York City, 1970. Photo by David Gahr.

Joplin was described by Record Mirror in 1969 as “a kind of mixture of Lead Belly, a steam engine, Calamity Jane, Bessie Smith, an oil derrick and rot-gut bourbon, funnelled into the 20th century between El Paso and San Francisco”.

As she told an interviewer: “Man, I’d rather have 10 years of superhypermost than live to be 70 sitting in some goddamn chair watching television.”

And she continued: “People aren’t supposed to be like me, make out like me, drink like me, live like me, but now they’re paying me $50,000 a year for me to be like me.”

“She was portrayed as this loud, Southern Comfort-drinking girl – and she definitely loved to have fun – but like so many women she was trying to find herself,” says Berg, who says that she fell in love with the singer as she learned more about her.

“She enjoyed the high of it, and she enjoyed what happened to her on stage when she was giving the audience everything she had inside, but she had a really hard time with trying to balance the high with the mundane aspects of life and finding the right people to balance it out with.” 

-Edward Helmore

 

Janis at Woodstock with girlfriend Peggy Caserta

Peggy Caserta

Janis and Peggy

The Peggy Caserta story is worth pursuing but the first book 'Going Down With . . . ' is largely not written by Caserta but was issued to fund her then drug habit of some substantial degree, she later went on to try to correct this scurrilous nonsense. Janis was certainly nothing if not bisexual and sought warmth companionship and sexual relationships wherever she found them but Caserta was a confirmed lesbian and couldn't cope with Janis' sexual predilection for men when it arose.