old ampex mic pre, at kampo in nyc.
I almost never watch movies these days. All I want to watch are band documentaries, preferably ones that have a lot of studio footage. I love that shit. I think it started with the DVD that came with the some of the European copies of Muse’s Absolution. Anyone who’s into studio porn should seek out that DVD. Killer.
Anyway, here’s the handful I’ve seen recently:
- Failure Golden: I was surprised to find this on cdbaby – I guess you’re buying directly from Ken Andrews? Pretty nice documentary, great footage of them recording with Albini. And good commentary tracks. Don’t do drugs, kids. [cdbaby]
- Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon: Very enjoyable. Pretty high budget as these things go. Includes Alan Parson and David Gilmour sitting down with the masters (well, probably Protools copies of the masters) and soloing up tracks.
- Punk – Attitude: Saw this on IFC and enjoyed it. Lots of vintage live footage and good interviews with Chryssie Hynde, Jim Jarmusch, Thurston Moore, and probably the best interviews I’ve heard with Jello Biafra and Henry Rollins. They’re selling it for $32, which is crazy, but it’s worth netflixing or whatever.
- Lamb Of God Terror and Hubris and Killadephia: No studio stuff but okay live footage and amusing tour hijinks.
- Iron Maiden Number of the Beast: Part of the same series (”Classic Albums”) as the Floyd DVD. Pretty good but not nearly of the same weight as the Floyd. This album meant a lot to me when I was 13, but I guess the story behind it isn’t as riveting as Dark Side. Not surprising.
- Judas Priest British Steel: Same series again. Pretty much a waste of time. Way too much interview time talking about the meaning behind songs like “Living After Midnight”. Uh.
- AC/DC Family Jewels: Awful. 2 DVDs worth of promotional AC/DC stuff, i.e. standing on soundstages lipsyncing. Avoid.
- Neil Young Year of the Horse: Also saw this on IFC. Very Neil Young… low-tech, raw, a bit spotty – but nice.
- Radiohead Meeting People Is Easy: Beautiful, slow, artsy. The band’s a bit whiny, which they have since explained elsewhere. I really like this DVD; it captures them in the midst of blowing up to mega-dom, trying to figure out how to deal with everything they didn’t realize they had signed up for.
I have a few others in the queue… Wilco I Am Trying To Break Your Heart, John Zorn A Bookshelf on Top of the Sky, Metallica Some Kind Of Monster, Lightning Bolt The Power of Salad, Dandy Warhols DiG.
I’d love to see more. Suggestions are welcome. There are a lot more in that “Classic Albums” series but I’m not sure how interested I am – maybe the Stevie Wonder one, maybe the Steely Dan one. If they have
footage from back in the day, sign me up.
I wonder if hobbyist/semi-pro programmers would enjoy watching footage of a software company’s day to day workings. “Check it out, he’s got Windows Explorer sorted by date. Huh.”
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Don’t know if they are still running it, but a week or two ago there was a documentary on Parliment Funkadelic (or Parliments/Funkadelic/Parliment Funkadelic/George Clinton and the P-Funk All Stars, depending on the song) that I thought was so great, I made Chelsi sit down and watch it again with me. Made me want to go out and collect their vinyl just for the art. Bootsy kicks ass!
Avoid ‘Some kind of Monster’ at all costs, watching Lars Ulrich blabbing garbage for a couple of hours surely will rot your brain…
Dig
the first half of the “Joshua Tree” Classic Albums DVD was excellent in my mind, as it confirmed that U2 is Edge’s band, not Bono’s. There’s a scene where Edge, Bono, and Daniel Lanois are all at the mixing desk listening and commenting about the music. Edge and Lanois are obviously total equals here. When Bono makes comments, he’s always looking at Lanois to get confirmation that what he said was actually right. Bono’s definitely on the bottom end of the totem pole in that team.
In another scene, Lanois is playing back “where the streets have no name”, and all that can be heard is tons of tracks of background synths that can _barely_ be heard in the final track. He talks about how they went down this route for awhile with bad results. He then pushes up one fader and *boom*, instant rock anthem. Edge’s guitar starts flying out of the speakers and it sounds like U2, where it clearly didn’t before. I wish I had the “edge fader” on my mixing board.
The last half of the DVD talks about the Joshua Tree tour, which is already a movie called “Rattle and Hum”. Not terribly interesting. They should have stuck to the studio footage.
I think I could watch any DVD where they’re playing with the studio tapes and soloing various tracks. Better yet, release some of the multi-track masters and let me play with remixing.
Also,
The Last Waltz–The Band; End of the Century–Ramones; Filth and the Fury–Sex Pistols
I haven’t even listened to Metallica since I watched Some Kind of Monster.
Non music related documentaries, but worth seeing:
Stoked: The Rise and Fall of Gator
Touching the Void
oh, here’s another one that’s supposed to be worth checking:
http://www.roadrunnerrecords.com/rrunited/
Its the ‘all-star’ sessions commemorating the 25th birthday of Roadrunner, the CD also has an accompanying DVD which has, supposedly, a shitload of studio footage. I haven’t seen it yet, but the reviews were fairly positive.
VH1 Behind the Music: Spice Girls
:)