Music Documentaries + Films -- S/D

I gotta put another vote in for that Tom Dowd Language of Music. Good God that was great.

Just watched Standing in the Shadows of Motown. I guess I like it primarily because it's a story you wouldn't see anywhere else, but the live performances and half-assed narrative drug it down a bit. The anecdotes from the band were priceless.

Watched Alan Freed's Rock Rock Rock last night. It views like the worst after shcool special ever, but the variety of musical performacnes say a lot about the era (1956).

Anyone got any recommendations for good recent UK docs? I just downloaded the Two Tone one...any others?

UK TV, I mean.

Saw 1991: The Year Punk Broke tonight, first time. "Teen Age Riot" was my favorite performance, "Polly" was good, and maybe I'll pull "Expressway to Your Skull" (a song that went right by me at the time) off the shelf. Found "Teen Spirit" a little flat, couldn't even make out the Ramones song. For the most part, the music was okay. I did find many of the between-song antics (Moore and Grohl especially) exceedingly annoying and unfunny. Wish Cobain had got to talk a bit.

Who goes to a theatrical screening of this film and decides that "Smells Like Teen Spirit" is an ideal time to duck out for popcorn? Things like that baffle me.

I saw this in high school and the only thing I remember about it now is that it made me hate Thurston Moore (as a person, not a musician).

As bad as he is--and he's awful, right from the opening credits--even worse is Dave Grohl's shtick with the backstage spread.

Link to press release (w video etc) re new DVD re George Crumb & Voice Of The Whale---looks promising:
http://campaign.r20.constantcontact.com/render?m=1102557630070&ca=3125f200-79ee-4dc3-a670-ecaabf524ca1

clemenza's latest post reminds me of this---finally saw & posted about it on ILE's Last (x) movies you saw:

The Decline of Western Civilization Part III (1998) Part I was a (near-?) contemporary report on early West Coast punk etc bands, Part III moves among "gutter punks," homeless teens, squatting and partying and panhandling ("Spare change sir? C'mon, save an old lady from gettin' mugged, spare change, spare change? Fuckit then." Theft is mentioned, but not shown; ass-peddling is neither. Lots of brief interviews, checking back in with several, in various settings (not too various, but some kids are more candid alone with Spheeris and her camera in a quiet side room, others as couples or in groups, relaxing in the latest living room or fave patch of sidewalk/alley.
They make it into some shows, incl. a band proudly claiming to be homeless too, which may (been a while) be the same one with a practice space in the random living room of a member's mom, a hoarder. Another band, Naked Getail, I think, is proudly Musical as hell, yet raw enough in sound design to get unreserved gutter punk response.
Fatalism for the most part, surprising optimism from a few ("I'll try to---I *will* get a job," though camera pulls back to show his friend rolling on the pavement with laffter). Death by misadventure, discussed at end, then credits and a final note that one of the kids is now in jail for fatally stabbing boyfriend (a fairly mellow couple onscreen). Currently on YouTube, though I saw it On Demand in weathered Suburbia: not so much a home invasion as a wall suddenly decaying again.

"Naked Getail," sheeit. Wikipedia lists the bands in this doc as: Final Conflict, Litmus Green, Naked Aggression and The Resistance.

I mentioned this on the Netflix thread, but the Jaco Pastorius doc that's streaming now is quite good.

opens in NYC today

http://filmforum.org/film/eat-that-question-frank-zappa-in-his-own-words-film

http://nypost.com/2016/06/23/zappa-doc-looks-back-at-a-lifetime-of-lousy-music/

my friends jake and neil made a doc about milford graves. gonna be at film society of lincoln center this spring. you should go!

https://www.filmlinc.org/daily/lineup-announced-for-the-2018-edition-of-art-of-the-real/

geeta really liked it:

http://4columns.org/dayal-geeta/milford-graves-full-mantis

If you look in the bowels of Netflix and Amazon Prime Video (in the UK at least) you'll find a fair few interesting documentaries, Of Montreal, Death, Tad, St Thomas, Lo Sound Desert (Kyuss etc:), Mudhoney, Pentagram, Colin Hay, Some nice Punk/Hardcore/SxE ones, Bad Brains/HR, tons really.

The Colin Hay one was nice enough. Also a surprisingly similar Tom Paxton one.

I watch all of these. I mean, ALL, even if I don't like the artist in question much.

Things US Netflix has that I've watched:

Ethan Hawke Chet Baker thing (interminable and overprecious)
Bowie: Man Who Changed the World (okay though true heads scurry over to HBO for the Last Five Years thing)
History of the Eagles (long and tedious of course, with moments of Walshian crazy that make it worth it)
Now More than Ever: The History of Chicago (honestly you can skip this)
Tom Petty: Runnin' Down a Dream (long but watchable)
What Happened, Miss Simone (highly recommended)
Mr. Dynamite: Rise of James Brown (okay but the biopic had more pizazz)
The Wrecking Crew (quite good, a good companion piece to Shadows of Motown and
Fred Armisen Standup for Drummers (nah, skip it)
Long Time Running (Tragically Hip, pretty good)
Anvil: Story of Anvil (highly regarded but a bit snoozy for me)
Glen Campbell: I'll Be Me (meh)
Miss Sharon Jones (good)
We Are Twisted Fucking Sister (okay)
It Might Get Loud (already discussed to death)
Beware Mr. Baker (meh)
Hired Gun (good)
Jaco (okay)
Danny Says (meh)
The Winding Stream (non-bad Carter Family doc)

Things on Netflix that I haven't watched yet but will report back:

Nat King Cole: Afraid of the Dark
Biggie & Tupac
Coach Snoop (the "Snoop Lion" Jamaica doc was entertaining)
When You're Strange
Parrot Heads (I may not get to this)

Amazon Prime right now has:

BOTH Sign O the Times and Graffiti Bridge.
Also a bunch of good DC punk/hardcore stuff.
And Stop Making Sense!
And 808, a really nice documentary about the Roland drum machine of the same name.
A reasonably charming thing about Pulp's last show in Sheffield.
And the LCD Soundsystem doc "Shut Up and Play the Hits."

Frankly all the streaming services are doing a decent job with this lately.

I love Pulp and always will but that documentary put me off them for a good couple of years

XP - The 808 Doc is great, really enjoyable

Fair enough, Camaraderie. As I say, I watch these regardless of my feelings about the artist, I find something to relate to in all of them. I watch them even when they're unpleasant and frankly terrible.

I liked the club kid interviewed by the river who said (more or less) that when you get mugged in London it's insulting and offputting, but when you get mugged at home it's kind of comforting, because you'll probably see the fuckers at the pub later and you can get back at them.

My favorite thing about the Jaco documentary was Joni Mitchell complaining about a bass player who quarreled with her about a note, saying, "that's not even in the chord!" And she said, "well, it WILL be, when you PLAY it."

Seriously these movies are like crack to me. There are dozens I forgot to list. Upside Down (the Creation Records one)! The Punk Singer. 20 Feet from Stardom.

I enjoyed the Lamb of God one on a recommendation from a friend, it has some unexpected twists and very little of their music in it, which was wise.

Thanks, MaresNest.

Also HBO has a dramatic, reasonably well-acted 2pac one right now (All Eyez on Me)

Omg guys, New on Netflix: a series called "once in a lifetime sessions."

Very nicely done. Great mix of live performance, interview, and studio footage. Vastly better than the usual hasty clip assemblage.

Currently watching the Nile Rodgers one and I'm in heaven.

There's also Moby and TLC and a Gallagher...

There's also Moby and TLC and a Gallagher...

I was about to ask if the Gallagher was the watermelon-smashing comedian or one of the schmoes from Oasis, and then I realized it didn't make any difference.

Hah, left it open that way on purpose because I don't care about any of the three of them. Pretty sure it's Noel and even though I don't care about him or Oasis, I will probably still watch it. I watch pretty much all music documentaries, regardless of my feelings for the artist.

That's interesting... I go the other way. I've seen music docs that have resulted in me liking the artists less afterward. They're really hard to do well, IMO

Some of the better music docs I've seen -- Dig! is one that springs to mind, and the Ginger Baker doc was great when the director stayed out of it -- are about artists I don't really care about/for.

And then there's something like 30th Century Man, about an artist I'm fanatical about, and I barely made it through one viewing.

What is particularly fresh about this Netflix series (so far) is that it focuses on the music to the exclusion of the personalities. These are new renditions, performed live, and you get to hear the whole song, interspersed with a discussion of its creation and meaning and structure.

I am a sucker for the "classic albums" series where the producer and the artist sit at a mixing board and solo / mute things and talk about them. But in those, it's mostly recorded music and old MTV or Rockpalast clips, not new in-studio recreations.

Of course I also like the "behind the music" stuff. Early struggles, touring to empty clubs, skyrocketing to fame and fortune, groupies, nightmare descent into drugs and alcohol, rehab, comeback, etc.

But I vastly prefer musk stuff about "yeah we had this little bit in D minor and I thought it was cool, then Eno said 'add a glockenspiel' and the rest is history.

Musk? Muso. Muso stuff.

Just wait for the Grimes doc with the Musk stuff.

Heh

Just noticed the Grant Hart doc is up on Amazon Prime video.

Yeah that's a top one. He's wistful and funny.

I guess that's a third category. cf. "The Punk Singer" (K. Hanna) and "Hit So Hard" (Patty Schemel).

Evergreen:

https://www.theonion.com/ask-vh1-behind-the-music-host-kris-kristofferson-1819583574

Yeah, my enjoyment of a documentary and performance videos is only very loosely coupled with how much I like particular records. With this past year's releases, I'm meh on the Khruangbin album, and love the Olden Yolk album. Yet I'm hypnotized by every gig video on youtube for the former, and couldn't make it through a session of the latter.

search

bjork live at royal opera house
roxy music (any live DVDs)
dj shadow-cut chemist live
pj harvey - please leave quietly (uh huh her tour with rob ellis and josh klinghoffer on drums)
bjork volumen (complete music videos)
goldfrapp - black cherry tour dvd

I liked parts of the PBS series "American Epic" on Amazon.

Much of it is historiography about early recording - blah blah Carter Family, Son House, etc.

The last episode is a bunch of recent and contemporary Americana ppl recording on reconstructed 1930s recording equipment, direct to vinyl.

Content/trigger warning: Jack White's fingerprints are all over it, but many bits shine in spite of his presence.

the series on dre was really great

honestly i prefer youtube interviews with musicians like the rick rubin kendrick lamar extended interview, though the older i get the less i care about what a musician has to say outside of their music, it is like demystifying the experience..the lyrics can give me what i need. im probably just an asshole tho

A very cuddly Quincy Jones doc is up on Netflix

There's a feature doc about ubiquitous NYC superfans/ merch couple Dennis and Lois (known to all local Mekons fans, for starters):

http://www.docnyc.net/film/dennis-and-lois/

further:

http://www.brooklynvegan.com/legendary-nyc-superfans-dennis-lois-the-subject-of-a-new-documentary-watch-a-clip/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DoBDSH_P9s

Is there a general thread on early rock critics? Couldn't find one.

I don't have much sense of Ben Fong-Torres as a writer. I've never read any of his books, and though I've known his byline probably since I first started reading rock critics, he's not in Stranded and he's not in my edition of The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock & Roll (second, I think)--Charles Perry, who goes hand-in-hand with Fong-Torres in my mind, gets both California chapters--and those two books are largely my frame of reference for early American rock critics. He does have a list in Gambaccini's first Top 200 book, and he must be somewhere in The Rolling Stone Record Review Volume II, a book I consult all the time, but I scanned a couple of sections and couldn't find him.

So I spent the first half-hour of Like a Rolling Stone: The Life & Times of Ben Fong-Torres wondering why the film was made: seemed like a nice guy who had lots of big names advocating for his importance, but there was a disconnect there for me. Gradually, it did become clear how central he was to the first few years of Rolling Stone, and I guess that in and of itself is historically important. (If this were a film on Brooklyn Dodgers '50 dynasty, he's not Jackie Robinson or Duke Snider or Roy Campanella--he's more like Carl Furillo.) Like Mikal Gilmore, but in a very different way, he has a brother who figures prominently in his life--that section was interesting. And while I imagine some people will recoil, I liked his scenes with Cameron Crowe. Crowe comes across like the 15-year-old version of himself in Almost Famous, still in awe of Fong-Torres.

The best parts are audio snippets from some of his '70s interviews: Ray Charles, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, Jim Morrison. Morrison comes across as much more soft-spoken and thoughtful than I would have guessed.

I like your Brooklyn Dodgers comparison. Carl Furillo....

I was watching it thinking, 'man, some of those interview cassettes look beat'

If they haven't already, I hope someone takes the initiative and digitizes them soon.

The Ray Charles excerpts were pretty pointed.

Got to see the forthcoming Aquarius Records documentary (still in festival only mode for the moment) -- a fun treat, and I have a nice little bit near the end (and an even smaller one in the opening credits).

I really wish this mania for cheap animation in music docs would stop tho

That ain't workin'
That's the way you do it
Get your money for nothin'
And your chicks for free

Billy was an odd duck and at almost every Boston gig I attended in the 90s. This should be a fascinating inside look into the whole scene.

I'm two episodes into Break it All: The History of Rock in Latin America and it's definitely worth checking out.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWprHs86xao

Yeah, I watched Rompan Todo last year and really enjoyed it.

Even if you don't want to commit to the full six episodes, the first two are amazing in the amount of old footage uncovered. I had never heard of the Avandaro Festival before and certainly didn't know how important it was.

"Catching Fire" was good!