The scene’s sensory overload expressed performers’ ego desperation

Evidence

The auditorium, every aspect of it—singers, light throwers, strobe operators, dancers—at all times are screaming with screeching, piercing personality pain. I say pain; it could also be called desperation. In any case, it is the last stand of the ego, before it either breaks down or goes to the other side. — J. Hoberman, Everything Is Now, 852

Categorization

• XREF: The ‘last stand of the ego’ reading of the EPI resonates with the chapter’s broader account of the shift from subculture to counterculture — the 1966-67 period where collectivity gives way to theatricalized self.