Lollapalooza: The Uncensored Story of Alternative Rock’s Wildest Festival (Book Excerpt)

The following book excerpt* from Richard Bienstock and Tom Beaujour’s excellent new book “LOLLAPALOOZA: The Uncensored Story of Alternative Rock’s Wildest Festival” (St. Martin’s Press , 2025; available here Amazon and here Barnes & Noble) looks at Lollapalooza 1996 in a chapter entitled “It Looked Like A Scene From ‘Island Of The Lost Souls’.” By the mid-’90s, five years after Lolla had launched, the indie scene and the festival were at an inflection point of sorts and a familiar cultural cycle . This was marked by the arrival of next wave more mainstream “alternative“ “bands (including bands like “Third Eye Blind, Better than Ezra and Candlebox”) which followed the festival’s “super Indie year” (with bands that included “Sonic Youth, Beck, Hole and Jesus Lizard”), but it hadn’t done well financially. This left Lolla in a predicament in trying to keep its unique indie voice while attracting fans and talent. Lolla co-founder Marc Geiger (former head of WME Music) advised moving more towards “loud & cred” bands while Jane’s Addiction frontman and fellow Lolla co-founder Perry Farrell moved more toward electronic and dance music as he was starting his Enit Festival. That year’s Lolla lineup, though, with Metallica, The Ramones, Screaming Trees, Soundgarden, along with a rotating bill that included Devo, Wu-Tang Clan and Rage Against the Machine, in retrospect, was an incredibly strong bill. Still, having to keep up with Metallica’s demands and increasing ticket prices from $27.50 to $35 (gasp) and having to play larger venues in smaller markets caused much consternation. In addition to Geiger and Farrell, this oral history features Metallica’s Lars Ulrich and Kirk Hammett, Soundgarden’s Kim Thayil, The Ramones tour manager Monte Melnick and bassist C.J. Ramone, DEVO’s Gerald Casale, as well as familiar live industry figures including Don Muller, Elliott Lefko, ,Andy Cirzan and Stuart Ross.

“It Looked Like A Scene From Island Of Lost Souls

STEVE “CHOPPER” BORGES (production manager, Lollapalooza 1993–97) Ninety-five did the worst business we ever did. And so I imagine the Lollapalooza people said, “We’ve gotta do something else.” Then somebody came up with this idea of, “Let’s do Metallica.”

MARC GEIGER (agent; co-founder, Lollapalooza) By ’95 and into ’96, “commercial-alternative” became a term. And bands like Third Eye Blind, Better than Ezra, Candlebox, I mean, you can come up with a whole bunch, were on the scene. And they were in the same name category as what we were presenting to the world. So in ’95, we went super indie. Sonic Youth headlining, Beck, Hole, Jesus Lizard . . . it was more “college radio.” And so Lollapalooza was trying to not be a mainstream follower, but to lead and expose culturally.

KORY GROW (senior writer, Rolling Stone magazine) You could see a big shift in what was considered alternative music between 1992 and 1995. I’ve read interviews with Marc Geiger where he calls a lot of bands that came out in that period “imitative” bands. And I think that’s a pretty astute observation about bands that saw this alternative and grunge explosion, and were inspired to form a band from that. And maybe they had always had these interests, but a lot of them sounded pretty similar.

CRAIG MARKS (editor in chief, SPIN magazine; author) It felt like there was a new band selling two million albums every other month. But then that dried up and there was no movement. Grunge, for instance, was not just like a band here and a band there; it felt like it was a cohesive-ish movement. And that’s always great as a magazine editor. Because there’s a scene involved and it’s not just like, “Here’s a band and there’s a band.” But that kind of ceased by ’96 or so.

JOHN RUBELI (second-stage manager, Lollapalooza 1993–95) Also, when people really started hopping on the internet in ’95-ish, ’96, it just be- came a different thing. How can you have a subculture if you can web- search everything? And at the same time, you have major labels now signing a lot of these acts they weren’t necessarily signing in ’91, ’92, or ’93. Maybe partly because of Lollapalooza.

STUART ROSS (tour director, Lollapalooza) When Lollapalooza started out, Perry’s idea was to get bands that were incredible but that were not getting enough attention, put them all together, and show everybody that alternative music was worth listening to. And he was absolutely right. But the more he was right, the more alternative music became mainstream. We were a victim of our own success.

MARC GEIGER And so the market, in my humble opinion, and in Perry’s, and in everybody’s, became polluted with sort of the follower-imitators, let’s just call them. And it didn’t feel good. So we wanted to point to credibility. Perry at that point had very much started to immerse himself in dance music, in the early days of dance culture and raves. He wanted to do an electronic show, or incorporate DJs. We thought it was early and not significant enough. I thought we should go for great, credible bands who have integrity. At the same time, Metallica was trying to get onto KROQ. They had made a record I knew about through their management [Load, released just prior to Lollapalooza, on June 4, 1996] that they felt very strongly about, and they were hoping that there could be a catalyst and a story there.

LARS ULRICH (drummer, Metallica) After the initial shock of being approached by Lollapalooza had sunk in, I realized that although we may not have been appropriate in ’91, Metallica in ’96 was more appropriate.

KORY GROW When Metallica broke into the mainstream a few years earlier with the Black Album [1991’s Metallica]—and that’s the album that had songs like “Sad but True” and “Enter Sandman” and “Nothing Else Matters”—they completely overhauled who they were trying to be, image-wise. They were simplifying their sound and getting rid of some of the jagged elements that had defined thrash metal and their early albums.

And with that, as legend has it, they all took a big vacation after the Black Album, and when they saw each other again, let’s say ’94, ’95, somewhere in there, they surprised each other that they’d all cut their hair. And in that time, Lars and Kirk specifically had gotten really into visual art and conceptual art, and they decided that they wanted to do something a little bit different with the band’s image. That’s when they started wearing eyeliner in photo shoots. And it also explains why they had the Andres Serrano artwork, “Semen and Blood III,” on the cover of the Load album. It was like they were turning Metallica in some ways into an art project. Which in hindsight should have made them very popular with fans of alternative music, because Nirvana and Kurt Cobain and a lot of these artists were very art-forward. But it wasn’t perceived that way, because Metallica were coming off the success of this major, big-box, Walmart-ready metal album.

KIRK HAMMETT (guitarist, Metallica) That whole period was fantastic because it was all a bunch of stuff no one ever expected from us. Everyone wanted the first four albums on repeat, but then we took them for a wild ride.

KIM THAYIL (guitarist, Soundgarden) I remember the offer that came to Soundgarden in 1996 was that Metallica’s name had come up about doing Lollapalooza. They were interested in doing it, and they said they would do it if we did it. That’s what we were told, at least.

MARC GEIGER We were very close to Soundgarden, who loved Metallica, and also the Ramones, who we wanted to feature on Lollapalooza, and they loved Metallica. And so I made a big case that after the indie rock that we should go in that direction—go loud and cred. You take Soundgarden and the Ramones, it’s loud and cred. Metallica, loud and cred. So that was sort of a theme. And Perry was alienated by that. He didn’t want it.

PERRY FARRELL Metallica, in my estimation at that time, wasn’t my thing. I was into alternative and punk and underground. My friends were Henry Rollins and Gibby Haynes and Ice-T . . . So I was not sure about Metallica back in those days.

MARC GEIGER Perry felt like we didn’t get it, and he sort of said, “I want to start my own festival called Enit.” Which was basically an early rave. Now, in fairness to Perry, in some ways he was very right, just early. But Perry felt a little alienated and he tuned out. I don’t remember how uninvolved he was, but he was definitely tuned out of it. Now, remember that with Perry, you have a lot of things. You have projects he’s working on at the time. You have drugs. But he was definitely not psyched about Metallica.

KIRK HAMMETT I saw that more as him trying to protect the brand name. Nothing really personal against us or the music, you know?

PERRY FARRELL It was a strange time, because they were transforming, we were transforming. Their music was aggressive, but what I was fighting for with Jane’s Addiction was to bring a sound to the world that was aggressive but also somewhat androgynous. I was not afraid of the feminine side of sound, shall we say. But Metallica proved themselves, and they are great, great people. I’ve become friends with them.

NIKKI GARDNER (assistant to Ted Gardner; special groups coordinator, Lollapalooza) I think both Perry and Ted were not happy with the headliner that year. Ted felt it was the beginning of the end, really. It was kind of at the point where we were looking at recycling bands. So Metallica, I think from the agents’ perspective, was the best option. But it was difficult. Everybody was trying to do their best.

JIM DeROGATIS (pop music critic, Chicago Sun-Times) Metallica on their own have had high points and some very, very low points. But they never belonged on a Lollapalooza bill.

KIRK HAMMETT There were so many detractors and so many protesters and people saying that Lollapalooza is ruined now that Metallica’s become a part of it. It’s lost its alternative-slash-grunge spirit or whatever. It was unfortunate to hear, but I wasn’t surprised. In fact, I was expecting it. We’ve been the unwanted guests to the party ever since Kill ’Em All came out. We’ve been well conditioned to expect stuff like this.

KIM THAYIL We figured, “Okay, this is a different demographic for them. And since Soundgarden has done Lollapalooza, maybe that would be a nice little bridge.” And the Lollapalooza guys came to us and said, “You can pick other bands to be on the bill. Is there anyone you’d like?” We said, “Let’s get the Ramones.” Because we had toured with the Ramones in Australia in ’94 on the Big Day Out, which is sort of the Australian version of Lollapalooza. We got to be great friends with those guys and we said, “We can’t believe they haven’t done a Lollapalooza, because they’re founding fathers for many of the acts.”

MONTE A. MELNICK (tour manager, Ramones) We had done a lot of festivals in Europe. But not in the United States. No one had ever asked!

C. J. RAMONE (bassist, Ramones) The fact that groups like Soundgarden and Rancid and Nirvana and Pearl Jam and Green Day all listed the Ramones as an influence, it definitely helped to bring attention back on the band in the nineties. Was Metallica directly influenced by the Ramones? I don’t know if they’re directly influenced. I’m sure they were fans, but the Ramones definitely influenced the Misfits, who definitely influenced Metallica, you know what I mean? And I was a huge Metallica fan. When Cliff Burton died, I tried to get an audition. That’s how much I love Metallica.

KIRK HAMMETT I announced the Ramones onstage a few times on that tour, and that’s where Johnny Ramone and I forged our friendship. Then we became freaking best friends after that.

MONTE A. MELNICK All the bands became friends with the Ramones, and they all told them that if it wasn’t for the Ramones they may not have formed these groups.

KIM THAYIL So Metallica asked for us, we asked for the Ramones, and we suggested the Screaming Trees, who were also on the bill.

GARY LEE CONNER (guitarist, Screaming Trees) We had the same managers as Metallica, and that’s probably one of the reasons we got on there. But we were really excited, because we had a lot of success with our previous album, [1992’s] Sweet Oblivion, and then for a lot of our own reasons, like our singer, Mark Lanegan, taking a deep dive into heroin during ’93, ’94, ’95, we had a long downtime when the alternative stuff got really big. We were like, “Man, we gotta get this thing going or the whole chance to make some cash is gonna pass us by.” So in ’96 we had a new record and we got on the tour . . . and that seemed to be the year the bottom fell out of the whole alternative/grunge thing. Like, “Well, this stuff is old hat now. We want something new.” And I guess for Lollapalooza that was Metallica.

KIM THAYIL And then there was a rotating slot on the main stage. And that rotating slot was where you get Rage Against the Machine on a few dates or a Wu-Tang Clan on a few dates or a Devo in the Southwest on three or four shows.

GERALD CASALE (bassist, singer, Devo) I certainly have vivid memories of that tour, because it was a head-scratcher. It was Metallica and Soundgarden at the height of grunge and metal, and, you know, “Here’s Devo!” But Perry Farrell asked us, and [Devo vocalist and keyboardist] Mark Mothersbaugh, who usually was saying no to everything all the time, for some arbitrary reason said yes. So there we were.

VAN CONNER (bassist, Screaming Trees) Fucking Devo blew every single band on that fucking tour off the fucking stage. It was un-fucking- believable. They ruled.

KIM THAYIL I watched Devo every set they did in that guest slot. I think they helped give some balance to the bill.

GERALD CASALE We knew what the lineup was, obviously, but I guess I didn’t know what I was about to see and experience in reality. When I saw that crowd and when I watched how they interacted, I thought, “You know what? De-evolution really is real!” It looked like a scene from Island of Lost Souls. Everybody kind of looked like ex-cons and the sort of guys that used to run the rides at carnivals. It just looked like a mob of criminals. And then they’re staring at us, like, “What in the fuck are you doing?”

DON MULLER (agent; co-founder, Lollapalooza) Booking Metallica changed Lollapalooza immensely. All of a sudden they came in, they were the headliners. It just killed the vibe. It fucking killed everything.

STUART ROSS Metallica made a lot of demands that year. We were not used to people telling us what to do, but Metallica took positions that they were not going to veer off of. For example, one of the things about Metallica is they did not want to play amphitheaters, and pretty much all we played were amphitheaters. They said, “We’ll do outside fields or we’re not doing the show.” And it became a serious point of contention. Now, full disclosure, I ended up going to work for Metallica in 2003 and worked for them for a number of years. I consider them good, smart businesspeople and family. But they took the position that it’s their show and they’re gonna do things the way they want to.

C. J. RAMONE What was going on was that Metallica had their own tour booked for later that year. So, instead of playing the A and B markets, we were playing the C and D markets in the middle of nowhere, especially in the Northeast. That’s how it was explained to me, anyway. And of course Metallica is a headliner, so they can do that.

THE NEW YORK TIMES (June 6, 1996) Putting together Lollapalooza this summer may be one of the hardest jobs any concert booker or promoter has had to face. The festival is operating with many new handicaps. Chief among them is its desire to travel only to outdoor fields that can hold 35,000 to 40,000 people (as opposed to last year’s amphitheaters, which held about 18,000). Along with the fact that Metallica and other bands want to tour major cities on their own after the festival ends in August, this has situated most of Lollapalooza’s shows in rural areas. For many of these smaller towns, which are not used to big rock shows, especially not in traditional venues like stadiums or arenas, Lollapalooza’s lineup is a scary freak show.

STEVE “CHOPPER” BORGES All the pressures that Metallica put on the festival—where you can play, where you can’t play, “We’re not gonna play at the major venue in major cities ’cause we’re gonna go out and do a headline tour afterward so we’ve gotta play thirty miles out of town”— they had a bunch of stuff. And since we were in fields, we needed to build stages, and I needed to have several roofs, several sets of scaffolding, leapfrogging ahead of me to the next shows. Also, that was the year of the Atlanta Olympics, so the bigger companies, the Mountain Productions and those kind of people, they had a lot of gear already being used in and around Atlanta. So there was a bit of a dearth of infrastructure— roofs, stages, scaffold, that sort of stuff. I’m trying to rent stuff and it’s just not out there. And I’m just patchworking it together. “Can I get this from here?” “Can you bring that out of Atlanta for this one show?” It was a quite a task.

STUART ROSS Then there’s the difficulty in obtaining a piece of land to do a show, which is not like it is today. People in those days remembered Woodstock, and towns being overrun by people they didn’t want in there. Dynamically, there were a ton of issues.

ANDY CIRZAN (promoter, Jam Productions) I’ll give you an example: The World Music Theatre, or whatever the hell Live Nation’s calling it now that they’ve bought it, was always the Chicago play back then. That was my venue. But the 1996 location was moved to a small town in central Illinois called Pecatonica. And I literally had to go out there and meet with the . . . I don’t know if it was the mayor or whoever . . . and basically tell them, “Um, so we’d like to bring this gigantic rock show to your state fairgrounds.” And they’re like, “Huh?” I had to assure them, “Our company has been doing this since the seventies, we’re Chicago-based, here’s our backstory . . .” I actually ended up having to go on local TV. And then we made some deal with them where we gave them money per head for their civic causes and things like that. But we played the Winnebago County Fairgrounds, and the audience size was probably two or three times the population of the entire town. It was like the invading Mongol hordes.

THE NEW YORK TIMES (June 6, 1996) Metallica has presented tour organizers with an additional problem: ticket sales. Though record executives expect the band’s new album, which was released on Tuesday, to sell close to a million copies in its first week (a nearly unprecedented coup), tickets to this year’s Lollapalooza have been selling much more slowly than last year’s, when the more obscure Sonic Youth was a headliner. And this summer success is more critical than ever, because of the extra $250,000 to $300,000 it costs to produce the show in such large fields.

STUART ROSS We had to bring in porta-johns, generators, gates, fencing, outside catering, parking attendants . . . stuff that we wouldn’t normally need in an amphitheater.

DAN CHOI (front-of-house coordinator, Lollapalooza 1994–97, 2003) We had mist tents, but you couldn’t get a hose out to the middle of a field. So then you had to think about water tanks. One of the tour positions was “plumber.”

STUART ROSS Our expenses were considerably higher. And I don’t re- member exactly what we paid Metallica, but it was way more than our usual budget would allow. So our ticket prices went up for the first time ever, from $27.50 to $35.

ANDY CIRZAN I don’t think the ticket price had a dramatic impact on things. But there had been remarkable consistency, and this was a per- centage increase, so . . .

MARC GEIGER When you produce a show in a field, expenses go up. Stages are bigger. Crowds are bigger. That’s real. But tickets, the pricing was still embarrassingly cheap. I mean, compared to today’s festivals, or even ten years ago, it was nuts. We were dramatically underpriced when you look back in history.

STUART ROSS Today, thirty-five dollars is the price of a beer in a stadium. You can’t even get parking for thirty-five dollars. But it was significant. Elliott Lefko, who’s now at Goldenvoice, was one of the talent buyers at that time in Canada. He said, “It’s too much. You’re gonna get pushback.” I thought he was crazy, but he was right.

ELLIOTT LEFKO (promoter, MCA Concerts Canada) Raising the ticket price was not a good thing. But it just seemed like it was doomed from the beginning. The results were not good.

STEVE “CHOPPER” BORGES To my recollection, the thing went on sale and it didn’t set the world on fire.

STUART ROSS It was not a stellar year.

DON MULLER You either experiment and grow, or you don’t.

*Excerpted from LOLLAPALOOZA: The Uncensored Story of Alternative Rock’s Wildest Festival by Richard Bienstock and Tom Beaujour © 2025 by the authors and reprinted by permission of St. Martin’s Press.