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"Just so I get this straight - when weir plugged into his amp and totally sperately when garcia plugged into his amp, they were both shocked?"
Look the Dead were wasted and bad at Woodstock but the shocks are a fact and part of Woodstock lore.
David N. Bromberg Interview with Jerry Garcia, 1/71
David: Why weren't the Grateful Dead in the Woodstock movie?
Jerry: Well, we played such a bad set at Woodstock. The weekend
was great, but our set was terrible. We were all pretty smashed,
and it was at night. Like we knew there were a half million people
out there, but we couldn't see one of them. There were about a
hundred people on stage with us, and everyone was scared that it
was gonna collapse. On top of that, it was raining or wet, so that
every time we touched our guitars, we'd get these electrical
shocks. Blue sparks were flying out of our guitars.
Three Days That Rocked the World (Sterling, 2009) also tells the tale of what went on from August 15-18th, 1969. Some of it is summarized as "three days of mud and electric shocks." Mickey is quoted as saying "It was the worst we ever played" and Bobby just remembers the "great blue spark about the size of a baseball" that lifted him off his feet.
The Grateful Dead came late on stage because Owsley Stanley (a.k.a. "Bear" - their soundman and electrical engineer) wanted to fix the electrical ground on stage. Also their heavy equipment had squashed the turnable stage. Further, the rain had flooded the stage and the band was in danger of electric shocks[1]. Songs got delayed because of long breaks between them.
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