FESTIVAL EXPRESS. Directed by Bob Smeaton. Featuring the Grateful Dead, Janis Joplin, the Band, Buddy Guy, Sha Na Na, others.

It didn’t have the cultural impact of Woodstock, but a year later another historic music festival occurred, further to the north. Largely forgotten today, the Festival Express featured a caravan of performers trekking across Canada to play a string of concerts. As the specially-outfitted train chugged across the country that summer of 1970, the musicians---including the Band, the Grateful Dead, Janis Joplin and Buddy Guy---collaborated and jammed on their favorite tunes. (The footage from this tour was in legal and financial limbo, until recently.)

Bob Smeaton’s new documentary features musical highlights from the tour, present-day commentary from the promoters and many of the musicians (Bob Weir, Guy, Eric Anderson) and, most memorably, clips of the various jam sessions from the train (most notably, a drunken-looking Rick Danko, of the Band, warbling “Ain’t No More Cane” with Joplin, Garcia and Weir). The relaxed atmosphere is in stark contrast to the concerts, which were stormed by naïve (and sometimes militant) hippies who insisted that admission be free.

The rowdy crowds apparently didn’t affect the onstage performances, which are memorable both musically and historically. The Band tear through Little Richard’s “Slippin’ and Slidin’”, while a slightly off-balance and noticeably puffy (probably all that late-night partying) Joplin, just three months before her death, still sounds as fierce as ever, on “Cry Baby” and “Tell Mama,” complete with autobiographical raps. Every current superstar female “vocalist” ought to be strapped to a chair and forced to watch this movie---just so they can learn what a real live, heartfelt performance is.