| DVD Roundup August 2005
 Recent
Rockumentaries on DVD
DVD is a video format for music lovers. Search
Amazon.com and you'll find an astounding number of music DVDs available -- everything from
concerts to music-video collections. Music documentaries are certainly not a new genre,
but their number grows each month. They run the gamut from informational programs about
certain performers or bands to full-fledged documentary movies based on some music-related
subject. They communicate a deeper understanding of their subjects by adding video and
commentary to the music.
These days, the most interesting documentaries on rock
music -- rockumentaries -- come from smaller distribution houses whose niche is precisely
that ignored by the big companies. Their films are for connoisseurs, people more
interested in form of expression and depth of coverage than the gossip and star power that
drive so much of the music industry. You won't find these DVDs at Blockbuster or Wal-Mart,
but various online sources sell them, and Netflix has them for rental.
Two recent DVDs from Palm Pictures are about very different
approaches to pushing the boundaries of popular music. The Nomi Song (***) is a
biopic about Klaus Nomi, a German singer and performance artist whose androgynous look and
operatic vocal range were a stir in the early days of new wave. Think David Bowie (for
whom Nomi sang backup vocals on a Saturday Night Live episode) crossed with Devo
and Maria Callas. Sadly, Nomi died of AIDS in the disease's early days, before people knew
what it was or how to treat it. The movie has some rough edges that are made up for by a
few daring touches from director Andrew Horn. Freestyle (***) discusses freestyle
rapping, tracing its oral roots to the cadence and rhythm of preaching and 1960s
performance poetry, and its musical influences to jazz and blues. Terms such as
"battle," "cipher" and "warrior" are defined, and the
difference between writers and freestylers is probed. I've taught and written poetry, and
I'm still trying to digest everything discussed in this movie. It's provocative to be
sure.
Plexifilm's I Am Trying to Break Your Heart (****)
was one of my favorite DVDs of 2003. It followed the band Wilco while it made Yankee
Hotel Foxtrot, an album thick with controversy. Along these same behind-the-scenes
lines is Low in Europe (***), a portrait of the Duluth, Minnesota trio Low that is
very much in the spirit of the band's slow, spare, introspective music. The band tours in
a smallish VW van and lugs all of its own gear to each gig -- not the picture of
successful 21st-century rockers. Low in Europe would be pretentious if the band
members weren't so genuine. "We're just kind of ordinary people," says
percussionist and singer Mimi Parker. She's right. Low in Europe is a different
kind of rockumentary: slow in pace, filmed with video cameras -- just the band's words,
lives and songs.
Also from Plexifilm is Eve Wood's Made in Sheffield
(***1/2), which traces the roots of British electronic pop to rebellion against industrial
life in Sheffield, England and admiration of punk rock, which bands like the Human League,
Heaven 17, and Cabaret Voltaire called "the catalyst" for their very different
music. The movie uses many interviews, still pictures, and film clips to tell the story of
a group of bands whose influence is obvious today. Its short 52-minute running time is
augmented by 76 minutes of extra materials.
Where would electronic music be without electronic
instruments? Moog (***1/2) considers the king of them all -- the Moog synthesizer
-- and its utility in the music world: "Fingertip control of what were really new
sounds at the time." It's a portrait of the machine and the mild-mannered man, Bob
Moog, who created it, as well as a philosophical discussion of music in the electronic
age. It has some great performances, including a smoking solo by Keith Emerson. A MiniMoog
V software demo is a bonus.
In 2003, Shout! Factory released the funny and poignant Off
the Charts (****), which covers the song-poem industry. What's that? Rent Off the
Charts and find out -- you won't regret it. The Fearless Freaks (***1/2) is the
story of the Flaming Lips, an Oklahoma City punk trio whose music evolved into offbeat
pop. "When we were young, I think we took too many drugs" is how front man Wayne
Coyne explains the musical progression. The Fearless Freaks weaves together
interviews of band members with performance footage, home movies, and childhood photos.
Even freakier is The Great Rock'n'Roll Swindle (**), a 1980 feature-length mock
rockumentary on the rise of the Sex Pistols. Imagine A Hard Day's Night crossed
with the theater of the absurd for an idea of The Great Rock'n'Roll Swindle's vibe.
You have to love the Sex Pistols to appreciate it, even though it is smattered with some
good musical performances.
Cuban-born director Josell Ramos arrived in the US as a
toddler, did cancer research at Memorial Sloan Kettering, and eventually went to work for
HBO. His directorial debut, Maestro (****), shows a flair for visual style while
explaining the genesis of the underground dance-music subculture that influenced disco and
is alive today. Larry Levan, David Mancuso, and Frankie Nuckles; Paradise Garage, The
Loft, and the Music Box -- these are the people and places of "the scene," which
was about beat-driven music, dancing, questioning society's rules, and releasing tension.
The two-DVD set is packed with almost two and a half hours of meaningful extra materials;
a soundtrack CD is also available.
A few of these titles would make an entertaining film
festival, especially The Nomi Song, followed by Made in Sheffield, and then Maestro
-- the music of each is certainly influenced by the other. Add in Moog, and you
have a mini-course on a few important ways in which rock'n'roll was reshaped in the 1970s
and 1980s.
…Marc Mickelson
marc@hometheatersound.com |
