05/06/2020
For at least 1 day in New York, Grand Funk Railroad was bigger than The Beatles.
It had taken the Beatles 80 days to sell out the Shea Stadium.
It had taken Grand Funk only 72 hours. According to stadium police officials, "It looked like World series fever all over again." In short, when tickets went on sale at Shea Stadium it was a veritable riot! More than 21,000 fans showed up on Saturday morning, June 5, 1971, when the sixteen ticket booths opened. 12.000 had spent the nigh to outside the stadium camping out in bags, tents and blankets, in order to assure themselves seats for the concert. Licence plates, of every concieveable type of vehicle crowding the parking lot, showed that fans had come from New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire, Delaware, Maryland, Rhode Island, and Ohio.
Sid Bernstein, promoter of the concert, the same man who brought The Beatles to Shea, affirmed. "This has broken every record we ever set with The Beatles. I would never say that anyone is more popular than The Beatles, but, Grand Funk's fans certainly have responded more quickly and with a different kind of enthusiasm."
"I Wanna Hold Your Hand" vs. I'm Your Captain". In the long run, we all known who won, if in fact it ever was an issue, but GFR was a huge band, 49 years ago today in NYC.
