Woodstock '99 was advertised as being a "millennium-defining celebration of peace, love and great music,” according to a Netflix documentary about the music festival. But it ended in riots, fires and disorderly conduct — and TODAY's Carson Daily watched it all spiral out of control.
With the Netflix documentary now streaming, the TODAY co-host is opening up about his memories of the infamous event, meant to be a followup to the famous 1969 festival in Bethel, NY.
At the time, Carson hosted MTV's "TRL" and had the chance to interview many of the artists who performed at the festival, which took place over several days in upstate NY.
In theory, it sounded like a pretty rad opportunity, but excitement soon turned into fright as Carson witnessed an out-of-control scene.
"All I can say is I thought I was going to die," Carson shared in the caption of an Instagram post, alongside a screenshot from the documentary. "It started off great, TRL live from the side of main stage interviewing all the bands (like Jay from Jamiroquai) & then started getting pelted with bottles, rocks, lighters, all of it."
"It got insane, fast. Nightfall, Limp plays 'Break Stuff' & the prisoners were officially running the prison. My boss (at MTV, Dave) says to our staff/crew backstage, 'We can no longer guarantee your safety, it’s time to go!' he continued.
Carson explained that he was in a production van “driving recklessly through corn fields to get to safety” and called the experience “so crazy (and) a blur.”
“I just remember feeling like I was in another country during military conflict,” he wrote.
In the comments, one Instagram user remembered watching this happen to Carson: "I vividly remember watching you live as bottles and things were getting thrown at you and you were dodging them As a 12-year-old at the time, I think I just assumed they didn’t like you because of 'TRL'… crazy to realize the bigger picture now as an adult."
Woodstock '99, which was also the subject of an HBO documentary in 2021, took place in Rome, NY. Carson explained that he has no intention of returning to the area anytime soon.
“I have so many fun memories from that era, this was not one of them. Needless to say, I haven’t taken the fam back to Rome, NY for a vacation,” he wrote.