14 incredible images of the Isle of Wight festival from the '60s and '70s

Back when The Beatles were part of the crowd
1/14

What would be your dream festival line up?

If you attended the Isle of Wight festival in 1970, you would have been treated to the likes of Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, The Doors and Jimi Hendrix just to name a few.

The 1970 Isle of Wight festival was attended by over 600,000 people - surpassing the attendance of Woodstock and causing it to be shut down the following year due to new laws.

It wasn't until 2002 that the festival was revived and has been a staple on the annual summer festivals calendar ever since.

Music fans dress in gold to celebrate Isle of Wight festival anniversary

The three-day festival now attracts around 60,000 revellers per year - just one tenth of what it was back in 1970.

This year's lineup sees The Script, Jessie J, James Bay, Liam Gallagher, Manic Street Preachers, The Killers and Camilla Cabello taking the stage across the weekend.

George Harrison (L), John Lennon (C) and Ringo Starr (R) at the festival in 1969
Getty Images

Yet, while we can expect to see many famous faces in the crowd, the original festival boasted attendees like John Lennon, Ringo Starr, George Harrison and Keith Richardson.

Click through the gallery above to see a snapshot of what the festival was like 50 years ago.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in