Open Air Pop Festival Aachen

The Open Air Pop Festival Aachen was one of the first major continental open air rock concerts and took place from July 10th to 12th, 1970 in the Aachener Soers on the grounds of the riding stadium of the Aachen-Laurensberger Rennverein (ALRV). About 30,000-40,000 visitors came on the three days of the event to hear mainly British, but also German, Dutch, Irish and Swiss rock groups.

Preparation and planning

The organizers were three young men from the Aachen area who had no experience in organizing such an event, only one of them had ties to the British music scene. Initial optimistic planning was based on around 150,000 spectators. The festival, which was originally to be called Europop , was advertised with prominent names, such as John Lennon and the Rolling Stones , with whom there were obviously no serious negotiations.

The festival should also offer other attractions, for example in the form of a folk festival . There should also be events and rides such as foam battles, bumper cars, a light dome, the assembly of the Olympic ball and the like. This was not realized because a was unclear with regard to the levying of the entertainment tax .

The venue was originally supposed to be the Tivoli in Aachen , but this did not happen. After the city of Aachen had adopted a fundamentally positive attitude towards the festival, the ALRV agreed to make the riding stadium available. The legally valid contract between the organizers and the ALRV did not come into effect until June 20, 1970, i.e. 20 days before the start of the event. The contract guaranteed the ALRV rental income of DM 30,000; In addition, a guarantee of 100,000 DM had to be provided and liability insurance had to be taken out for damage up to 1,000,000 DM. In addition, the organizers undertook to keep the interior of the stadium free of visitors, which in retrospect turned out to be an illusion.

Commercial Aspects

The entrance ticket for three days cost 40 DM, the day entrance was 15 DM. Fake tickets appeared weeks before the event. As a result, private detectives were able to arrest a group of counterfeiters with 10,000 tickets, and a further 6,000 false tickets had already been put into circulation. According to the Aachener Volkszeitung, the head of the group of forgers is said to have been a former member of the Socialist German Student Union .

The event was not a commercial success: on the one hand, this was due to the false admission tickets that had come into circulation, but also due to the fact that over the course of the three days visitors without an admission ticket gained access through torn fences. In addition, the forecast visitor numbers were obviously too optimistic from the start.

Logistics and security

The administration of the city of Aachen was involved with 90 people in the implementation, another 420 people were involved in various positions as helpers. The police, which was represented by around 45 officers, worked 14,800 hours, but stayed in the background. Two trains of the riot police were on call at the nearby TÜV site, as well as two water cannons .

The technical relief organization viewed the entire event as an exercise and provided lighting and washing facilities. In addition, the city of Aachen provided three air raid shelters from the Second World War as accommodation.

There were 28 arrests, mostly drug traffickers .