Roy, what a great review. I haven’t seen this yet but it’s on my list. Coincidentally, I was talking to my oldest son last night (both are in their mid-twenties, right on the cusp of Millennial/Zoomers) about this doc. He’d just seen it, and we talked about the music and Apollo 11 and Jeff Bezos, and my son said in a bemused tone “it’s incredible, over 50 fucking years and not that much has changed.”
So yeah, the younger generation are very struck by our present time and the “arc of the moral universe” stuff, and are more than able to draw their own conclusions. The Right gets crazier, but they can’t put the genie back in the bottle and they know it, hence their panic.
Seven different people contacted me the day after this premiered asking me if I had/telling me I had to right away watch this. All white folks (we're cliquish and tend to run in packs). It was a week before I could finally sit and watch. What a fine film! Your review (as always) is spot on.
( You alone, I venture to say, among the online left, can right a cogent book/film/music review. Alterman actually can, he writes well, has great taste but seems like a bit of a prick. Everyone one else though - I usually avoid anything titled "Music Notes" or" Oscar Picks " )
I have three kids who taught me as much about music as I got to teach them . They got Patti Smith, Talking Heads, Lou Reed , Television, Jefferson Airplane, Bob Dylan, NWA , Ry Cooder etc from me - I stole their Beck, Fugees, Rage Against the Machine, Sublime. I bet they would all say one of the best things the got from me is Sly and the Family Stone. I love Sly. Watching him and the band makes me so happy! One day last year I walked in on the grand kids playing legos at the kitchen table. They were singing along about how they were" Everyday People" I'd like to think my youngest grandaughter had just said "Alexa, play some Sly!" though I imagine it was just on one of her mother's mixes.
This is the sort of story I had been digging towards in my younger-person enthusiasms for Funk, but intuited that other storytellers could do it better, with more authenticity. This sounds like the warmup for also-epochal Wattstax, and I can't wait to see this later today!
An amazing concert. Cue some geriatric bullshitter at the end of the bar claiming, “I was there, man, right before I headed to Woodstock and walked on the moon. It was so great, you shoulda been there!”
I was looking forward to watching this but now even more so. (If for no other reason, I have to see if the reporter's name really was Bolt Upright. It sounds like something right out of "Putney Swope," whose creator just died a couple of weeks ago.)
Sly Stone's "Stand!" and just a couple of years later, Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On" were landmarks, the kind of records that people like to say "changed music forever." They really didn't, people kept on releasing lots of crap music then and since, but they did influence a whole lot of people, in and out of music. And Sly's was every bit as important as Marvin's, IMO.
So many of the artists you mention are still on my daily play list rotation. Hugh Masekela definitely tops for me, Nina Simone and the rest. Looking forward to seeing the movie, thanks for the review!
The other notable thing about the Lindsay footage is that it's a reminder that once upon a time there were "liberal" Republicans, AKA Republicans who weren't total dicks. It was a simpler time...
I started watching Judas and the Black Messiah last night. The style of filmmaking immediately put me off. I was not interested almost immediately because I felt its inauthenticity. It was like the moon landing having no meaning really for many people outside the frame. I turned instead to American Gangster in progress, and found that portrayal and particularly the costumes and the visuals more authentic to roughly the same time and place.
Yes, it's a weird Hollywood tale and has a peculiar ending of corrupt cops going to prison by the dozens, and the Jewish prosecutor played oddly by Russell Crow immediately after concluding his successful prosecution of the black gangster drug lord becomes a defense attorney and gets the sentence reduced from 70 to 15 years.
I feel a bit like the bull bewildered by the cape. Am I already dead, or is the sword still coming? I even enjoyed watching several episodes of The Lone Ranger with my dad last week. All the corn and nonsense was like bad chicken noodle soup I from a can I used crave as a child.
Roy, what a great review. I haven’t seen this yet but it’s on my list. Coincidentally, I was talking to my oldest son last night (both are in their mid-twenties, right on the cusp of Millennial/Zoomers) about this doc. He’d just seen it, and we talked about the music and Apollo 11 and Jeff Bezos, and my son said in a bemused tone “it’s incredible, over 50 fucking years and not that much has changed.”
So yeah, the younger generation are very struck by our present time and the “arc of the moral universe” stuff, and are more than able to draw their own conclusions. The Right gets crazier, but they can’t put the genie back in the bottle and they know it, hence their panic.
Seven different people contacted me the day after this premiered asking me if I had/telling me I had to right away watch this. All white folks (we're cliquish and tend to run in packs). It was a week before I could finally sit and watch. What a fine film! Your review (as always) is spot on.
( You alone, I venture to say, among the online left, can right a cogent book/film/music review. Alterman actually can, he writes well, has great taste but seems like a bit of a prick. Everyone one else though - I usually avoid anything titled "Music Notes" or" Oscar Picks " )
I have three kids who taught me as much about music as I got to teach them . They got Patti Smith, Talking Heads, Lou Reed , Television, Jefferson Airplane, Bob Dylan, NWA , Ry Cooder etc from me - I stole their Beck, Fugees, Rage Against the Machine, Sublime. I bet they would all say one of the best things the got from me is Sly and the Family Stone. I love Sly. Watching him and the band makes me so happy! One day last year I walked in on the grand kids playing legos at the kitchen table. They were singing along about how they were" Everyday People" I'd like to think my youngest grandaughter had just said "Alexa, play some Sly!" though I imagine it was just on one of her mother's mixes.
This is the sort of story I had been digging towards in my younger-person enthusiasms for Funk, but intuited that other storytellers could do it better, with more authenticity. This sounds like the warmup for also-epochal Wattstax, and I can't wait to see this later today!
An amazing concert. Cue some geriatric bullshitter at the end of the bar claiming, “I was there, man, right before I headed to Woodstock and walked on the moon. It was so great, you shoulda been there!”
I was looking forward to watching this but now even more so. (If for no other reason, I have to see if the reporter's name really was Bolt Upright. It sounds like something right out of "Putney Swope," whose creator just died a couple of weeks ago.)
Sly Stone's "Stand!" and just a couple of years later, Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On" were landmarks, the kind of records that people like to say "changed music forever." They really didn't, people kept on releasing lots of crap music then and since, but they did influence a whole lot of people, in and out of music. And Sly's was every bit as important as Marvin's, IMO.
Beautifully written as ever, and your praise for this remarkable film is spot-on. Thank you.
So many of the artists you mention are still on my daily play list rotation. Hugh Masekela definitely tops for me, Nina Simone and the rest. Looking forward to seeing the movie, thanks for the review!
Mahalia and Mavis live? Holy shit!!
The other notable thing about the Lindsay footage is that it's a reminder that once upon a time there were "liberal" Republicans, AKA Republicans who weren't total dicks. It was a simpler time...
Excellent essay. I heard Questlove being interviewed on Fresh Air yesterday. Pretty impressive guy he is.
I started watching Judas and the Black Messiah last night. The style of filmmaking immediately put me off. I was not interested almost immediately because I felt its inauthenticity. It was like the moon landing having no meaning really for many people outside the frame. I turned instead to American Gangster in progress, and found that portrayal and particularly the costumes and the visuals more authentic to roughly the same time and place.
Yes, it's a weird Hollywood tale and has a peculiar ending of corrupt cops going to prison by the dozens, and the Jewish prosecutor played oddly by Russell Crow immediately after concluding his successful prosecution of the black gangster drug lord becomes a defense attorney and gets the sentence reduced from 70 to 15 years.
I feel a bit like the bull bewildered by the cape. Am I already dead, or is the sword still coming? I even enjoyed watching several episodes of The Lone Ranger with my dad last week. All the corn and nonsense was like bad chicken noodle soup I from a can I used crave as a child.