Good Documentaries

mjp

mjp

Founding member
skiroomalum said:
A Band Called Death about three brothers from Detroit who preceeded the punk movement by a couple of years.
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I saw that a couple weeks ago. It was good, but I thought it was a little odd that some of these people from Detroit were saying things like, "no one ever sounded like that," when Detroit is where everyone sounded like that. MC5? Stooges? I think a lot of the hook there, what makes the story interesting enough to do a documentary about, is the fact that they were black guys playing that kind of music. Which ultimately made the whole thing feel a little weird to me. Still a good movie though.

What really got me was how much some of the tracks sounded like Bad Brains, at least vocally. HR has a very distinctive style, but David Hackney was popping off HR-style when HR was still in high school. That was pretty wild. And the story of their kids friends discovering the music was really interesting. Shows how just a couple of hipsters with boners for rare records can really start a chain reaction.
 
mjp

mjp

Founding member
I watched that entire thing because the history of rock and roll is amazing.

Even the stupid parts.

And nothing is more stupid (or amusing) than Yes (or any of the rest of them) in the 80s, cutting off their hair, putting on multi-color jackets with big shoulder pads and throwing a gate on the snare drum in a desperate and pathetic bid to remain relevant. The 80s were a musical desert, but at least that awful decade accomplished one great thing - it buried the pompous twiddle wankery of that whole flappy gaggle of posh, teacup twats.

"We were a bunch of smart guys who were great musicians and couldn't stand to just play the same three chords over and over." Well. Look at you. Congratulations.

The only problem with that incredibly condescending proclamation is how laughably backward and unaware it is. A truly great musician could play three chords over and over, and even make those three chords transcendent and inspiring. The only thing those fussy windbags ever inspired anyone to do was put on a different record.

"They didn't care about the audience..." No shit?

Other than that though, it was a great little documentary. Thanks. I feel better. ;)
 
Erik

Erik

If u don't know the poetry u don't know Bukowski
Founding member
These guys can prog rock the rocks off any Brit prog rockers any day.
(OK, so maybe its acid rock, I dunno.)
That back beating drum stick has me thinking of a reggae beat.
There's even an orchestra cuddled up in the background!
These guys blended in a bit of everything.
Don't know if they use more than 3 chords, but hey, who's counting?
Where did these guys come up with this sound?
Remember the instructions: PLAY LOUD.

 
mjp

mjp

Founding member
His work reminds me of Indian ledger drawings. Interesting parallels there - marginalized people making art on the scraps of the "civilized" world (art that was only saved for posterity by the heroic efforts of "forward thinking" white people - funny how that always happens).

That domain/site's been around since June of 2011. Wonder if they ever got the whole film together.
 
d gray

d gray

tried to do his best but could not
Founding member
that's what i thought, too.

oh well, the preview was good...

his drawings have gone for over 150 grand at auction. i read that the director of the MOMA in new york generously offered to buy a bunch of them in the 1940's for a dollar each but was turned down by the (white) guy who "discovered" him.
 
justine

justine

stop the penistry
i really liked it! i didn't know much about it beforehand, but i thought it was very sweet. sure, it seems odd, but it also seems to be making a lot of people very happy.

the ricky jay doc is up on netflix instant - pretty decent, but somehow not as engrossing as i thought it would be. definitely wanted to know more about what happened with his family.
 
justine

justine

stop the penistry
he talks a lot about how his grandfather was the one who introduced him to magic and was friends with a lot of great magicians, then he says "the one kind memory" he has of his parents was them organizing some magician he loved to appear at his bar mitzvah. he left home at 16 because his parents "didn't get" him and they had "no rapport" and he hasn't been home since. i wanted to know more details about this because i'm super nosy! it just felt like there was much more to the story. even his manager said that he had never asked jay about his family in the 30+ yrs they'd known each other, because he instinctively felt like it was a line that shouldn't be crossed.
 
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justine

justine

stop the penistry
cutie and the boxer (streaming on netflix) is really good - it's about two elderly japanese artists who live in new york, and their rather tumultuous relationship over the years. he was a well known avante gard artist in japan before moving to the US and she was 20 years younger than him when they married. her art has always been on the sidelines, and the doc sort of follows noriko finally asserting herself through her artwork.

gregory crewdson: brief encounters (also streaming on netflix) - somehow never heard of this guy before, even though he's apparently one of the more famous contemporary fine art photographers. this doc follows the production of beneath the roses: huge, staged, narrative photos of scenes set in small-town america. kind of a blend of edward hopper and mary ellen mark. the film isn't mindblowing or anything, but it's pretty cool getting a view behind the scenes of what goes into producing the photos.
 
skiroomalum

skiroomalum

I've had tickets to see him twice but he couldn't make it either time. Once with the Popes due to visa issues, and
once with the Pogues due to broken leg issues. Did see him at a coffee house on Highland in L.A. years ago, when
he literally stumbled in thinking it was a bar. Great, great songwriter.
 
ozzyparkinson

ozzyparkinson

Give up checking after thread 1 so my apologies if its in the 10 later threads but
Searching for sugar man
9 to 5 - days in porn

For you conspirisists (funny made up shit)
Did aliens build the pyramids
Did man land on the moon

O and Bra boys!
 
Ponder

Ponder

"So fuck Doubleday Doran"
RIP
Ifallgoeswrongcover.jpg



 
Skygazer

Skygazer

And in the end...
Nice doc about the Northern Soul scene - still going strong, weird that Blackpool (northern english seaside resort) became a focus for it (Wigan too) and punk, which holds a big international festival there every year. If you have ever read Irvine Welsh's Skagboys and wondered what it all was, this will explain it:
 
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d gray

d gray

tried to do his best but could not
Founding member
Cry Baby: The Pedal That Rocks The World tells the story of the wah wah effect pedal, from its invention in 1966 to the present day.

edit after watching it - who would've thought a movie on guitar gear could be so entertaining?

 
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