Music Documentaries...

Just saw an ad on SBS advertising that they are starting up a series on music documentaries starting next Sunday night at 9-30PM local time. Can't find anything on the series but the first one is;

King of Hollywood: Inventing David Geffen about the guy behind Joni Mitchell Guns N' Roses as well as co-founder of Dreamworks an produced Cats and Dreamgirls. Think its a combo music + hollywood industry doco.
 

Rusty Brookes

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Mate put me onto this doco. Have watched the first 20mins and it appears like a cross between Anvil and High On Crack Street. FWIW, I really dig some o' Pentagram's 70's material (released thanks to the fan dude in the doco)



Prob'ly watch the rest tonight


Yes all the way. Pentagram were/are an awesome band (my band Fortress of Narzod does a cover of Last Days Here - gratuitous plug over) and the doco is riveting stuff.
 

skilts

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I visit a site called Top Documentary Films that has links to what they consider the top docos in various topics to be (an hour ago I went there to find the link to a drugs in sport doco for a thread in the hot topics board).

Here is the link for the performing arts section. There might be docos in there some of you have seen but have forgotten.

http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/category/music-performing-arts/
Thank you so much for this link. I found its content fascinating and most instructive. Needless to say, it's now in my bookmarks.
 

Interceptor

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Snippet from the Guitar Heroes series, focusing here on Ritchie Blackmore.
The bit where he talks about changing musical direction is like a scene from Spinal Tap, the deadpan delivery is gold!

 

Gus Poyet

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This looks interesting:

http://lineout.thestranger.com/lineout/archives/2013/03/03/the-arsehole-glory-of-ginger-baker


Just viewed this one.

Never knew much about him so was a good watch to see his personality and how his career unfolded and his personality come to the fore.
 

Gus Poyet

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Just heard about this and look forward to seeing it...

http://www.dfw.com/2013/07/03/807132/movie-review-a-band-called-death.html

Claiming first punk band rights that I disagree with but looks interesting anyway.



Another good doco. I also think it's a stretch that it's being labelled as the first punk band.

I did like their music though. If they'd been in a different town and a few years later they'd probably have made it as a band and not have been consigned to an attic for so many years.
 
Stax is an amazing story. I went and visited the museum in Memphis a couple of years back and it was absolutely fascinating. So much cooler and grittier than Motown ...
Gritier sound, no doubt, but Motown was revolutionary. Motown was born in a working class slum and simply had a visionary genius that was willing to exploit any and all available talent to create an iconic sound never been heard. No doubt Stax was fantastic, but Berry Gordy was in a different league imo.
 

Gus Poyet

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Gritier sound, no doubt, but Motown was revolutionary. Motown was born in a working class slum and simply had a visionary genius that was willing to exploit any and all available talent to create an iconic sound never been heard. No doubt Stax was fantastic, but Berry Gordy was in a different league imo.


Stax for mine was a more remarkable story because they did it in a time and place when the civil rights movement and struggle was basically at their front door step.

The motel where Stax artists had to stay to be able to use a swimming pool because of segregation was the same motel and balcony where Martin Luther King was shot.

At that time, Detriot was a far easier and safer place to conduct a business compared to Memphis for blacks.

Added Stax was probably more revolutionary because they incorporated mutli-racial bands/artists and that band the great Booker T and the MG's provided the music for hundreds of songs on that label..

 

MC Bad Genius

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Stax >>>>>>> Motown.

Gimme that southern fried soul sound any day!

Yeah, this a thousand times. That's not to say that Motown wasn't great as well, but I just prefer the sound of the Stax artists and the stories about all the players a bit more than the Motown ones.

That being said, Standing In The Shadows Of Motown was still a great movie.
 
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Anyone heard of/seen this doco that's around about Ginger Baker? Apparently it's as brilliant as it is shocking. He really is one of god's own prototypes.
 

red+black

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Coming to MIFF in August are a bunch of music documentaries. Here are the trailers for Hendrix, Nas, Pulp and Nick Cave:







 

red+black

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Sorry, yeah, listed in the Documentaries category of the Festival Guide, but yeah, not an actual documentary.
 

Ron The Bear

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TBF the Hendrix one is a biopic rather than a straight-up doco. Still looks rad though.

"When the power of love takes over the love of power, that's when things will change."

Seen this ascribed to Hendrix in various places but there is no record that he actually said it. Swallowed unquestioningly by worshippers who wish he'd said something profound.

From the trailer:
look 7.5/10
voice 7/10
guitar tone 8.5/10, but too clean

Looks better than some other efforts, will give it a try.
 
Haha yeah I love a good biopic that makes a musician seem more profound than they really were. I don't mind a bit of embellishment, am quite happy to go along with stuff for the sake of a movie/story. E.g Walk the Line is one of my fav movies, don't know how true to life it is though.
 

Ron The Bear

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Haha yeah I love a good biopic that makes a musician seem more profound than they really were. I don't mind a bit of embellishment, am quite happy to go along with stuff for the sake of a movie/story. E.g Walk the Line is one of my fav movies, don't know how true to life it is though.

Hendrix had the potential to be an incredibly powerful figure. Nixon invited him to the White House for a "fireside chat" in an attempt to tap into the psychology of the counter-culture, and he was pressured by black militant groups to make a stand for his race. Partly fuelled by drug use, during the 1970 tour he became paranoid about being assassinated by a sniper during a show. But the reality was that Hendrix wasn't interested in politics. This is a guy who thought LSD was the answer to everything; "There's a lot of long-hairs running around with nothing in their heads" was about the limit of his lucidity, distancing himself from the hippie movement with which most associated him. The turbulence of the times was reflected in his music which became more intense and less fun; people looked up to Hendrix, but his attempts at social commentary during concerts are generally forgettable. What he was serious about was music, and he eventually lost his way even in that, completing barely anything to his satisfaction in the studio in the last two years amid constant band changes.

He had an incredible gift, but Jimi was no prophet.
 
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Hendrix had the potential to be an incredibly powerful figure. Nixon invited him to the White House for a "fireside chat" in an attempt to tap into the psychology of the counter-culture, and he was pressured by black militant groups to make a stand for his race. Partly fuelled by drug use, during the 1970 tour he became paranoid about being assassinated by a sniper during a show. But the reality was that Hendrix wasn't interested in politics. This is a guy who thought LSD was the answer to everything; "There's a lot of long-hairs running around with nothing in their heads" was about the limit of his lucidity, distancing himself from the hippie movement with which most associated him. The turbulence of the times was reflected in his music which became more intense and less fun; people looked up to Hendrix, but his attempts at social commentary during concerts are generally forgettable. What he was serious about was music, and he eventually lost his way even in that, completing barely anything to his satisfaction in the studio in the last two years amid constant band changes.

He had an incredible gift, but Jimi was no prophet.

This movie looks pants. The Hendrix Trust denied them the right to use his music so it's only about up until recording his first album. I guess it might be a bit like 'Nowhere Boy' the Lennon movie but doesn't seem to have got many decent reviews.
 

Ron The Bear

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This movie looks pants. The Hendrix Trust denied them the right to use his music so it's only about up until recording his first album. I guess it might be a bit like 'Nowhere Boy' the Lennon movie but doesn't seem to have got many decent reviews.

They were putting out (hit) singles well before the release of the album. Kathy Etchingham (as close to a steady girlfriend as Hendrix got in this period) slammed the film. She says the bit where Hendrix bashed her with a telephone handset until Lennon & McCartney took the phone off him, never happened (although it is mentioned in the Charles Cross book, and there are later documented episodes of Hendrix exhibiting violence towards women). Someone should ask McCartney.

Hendrix did everything a bit differently. I can't imagine a more difficult subject to mimic.
 
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