Laurie Anderson, Velvet Underground, these reminders of life 50+ years ago make me want to institute a Memorial Day to celebrate what the rest of us sane people were doing while the Best and Brightest were dragging our generation into endless wars.
I’ve been looking forward to this film, too. I enjoy Todd Haynes’ work, I found I’m Not There so hypnotic it made me feel like I was on drugs (in a good way) even though I was completely sober. It will be a while before I can see this one – I don’t have Apple TV and I won’t be going back to theaters for a while – but thanks for the review!
Surely it's me, but I missed the explanation of how the documentary failed. Me, I care far more for the info delivered than how it's delivered. Maybe because it's the Rashomon syndrome sort of: Put x people together testifying as it were, you get x+1, of which who knows how many truths are delivered. Then again, I enjoyed the Curtis docs, I Can't Get You Out of My Head, in which the pieces (interesting!) fail to come to a coherent point. But as I've been wont to say, the journey is the destination so, you know, the pieces can be good enough for me even if the package fails as a package.
I was also a little let down overall. I thought it did a great job showing the time and place and ideas that produced the band. After that it got less informative; there was nothing about how they made the sounds they made or why. Instead just another rehash of the tired "west coast hippies are dumb" thing (and I really didn't need to hear wingnut tea Partier Mo complain about nobody feeding the homeless, like the Diggers didn't exist).
I loved Velvet Goldmine much more than my deeply closeted self could let on. Cool to see Haynes still going strong.
Dunno how much I like band-centered documentaries, as they tend to be exercises in the mutual gravitational pull of enormous egos (the band's drawing towards the critic/director's) in a bid to argue how whatever band was the Zeitgeist itself. That's why Summer of Soul appealed me so much: it was a wistful acknowledgment of What Could Have Been.
This always makes Serious Music Brahs gasp, but I never had much use for VU. I can see clearly what I owe them as a fan of punk & glam & alt & post-rock, but meh otherwise. Sorry 'bout it -- no disrespect meant.
For me "Sister Ray" will always the name of the giant cannon Shinra builds to destroy the Ultima Weapon in FF7. It only made things worse of course, but it's a good song too.
Bummer about Angus MacLise. He was a lot more than the VU's Stuart Sutcliffe. The story about him and Loudon Wainwright getting busted for weed is always a surprise. And does Doug Yule get a cameo?
Another good one, with a lot to chew on. I think it's virtually impossible to do a rockumentary (if you will) that's not a director's love letter to his teenage self fan, the temptation to tell that kid "you were right, here's why they were so important" is just so powerful. And if they didn't care about the band, you get Behind The Music. I was too old for Velvet Goldmine, and was kind of embarrassed at how naked Todd's love of the artists was as characters in his private fantasy. And I love Iggy and Bowie.
The Lou quote about the Mothers doesn't surprise me, the Mothers were a conceptual band, which would be catnip to an east coast artist, and my impression of Frank is that he was Extremely good at ingratiating himself with people who could be useful to him.
I'll use this as an excuse to recommend Kim Newman's "Andy Warhol's Dracula", and to a lesser degree the collection in which it's most easily found, "Johnny Alucard". It's set in Newman's "Anno Dracula" universe in which 'Dracula was not distracted from his plan to take over the British Empire by his affair with the wife of a rural solicitor',and features Lou Reed, on being told that Warhol had become a vampire, responding with 'Andy was alive?'.
Laurie Anderson, Velvet Underground, these reminders of life 50+ years ago make me want to institute a Memorial Day to celebrate what the rest of us sane people were doing while the Best and Brightest were dragging our generation into endless wars.
I’ve been looking forward to this film, too. I enjoy Todd Haynes’ work, I found I’m Not There so hypnotic it made me feel like I was on drugs (in a good way) even though I was completely sober. It will be a while before I can see this one – I don’t have Apple TV and I won’t be going back to theaters for a while – but thanks for the review!
Two days of art/culture in a row? About the two coolest people ever ?(They were superhellacool apart- when they got married the decision was final!)
Just another great thing about this beautiful October day.
I'll see it and probably love it and in the end mostly I'll be sad those days are gone.
Surely it's me, but I missed the explanation of how the documentary failed. Me, I care far more for the info delivered than how it's delivered. Maybe because it's the Rashomon syndrome sort of: Put x people together testifying as it were, you get x+1, of which who knows how many truths are delivered. Then again, I enjoyed the Curtis docs, I Can't Get You Out of My Head, in which the pieces (interesting!) fail to come to a coherent point. But as I've been wont to say, the journey is the destination so, you know, the pieces can be good enough for me even if the package fails as a package.
IMO, of course.
I was also a little let down overall. I thought it did a great job showing the time and place and ideas that produced the band. After that it got less informative; there was nothing about how they made the sounds they made or why. Instead just another rehash of the tired "west coast hippies are dumb" thing (and I really didn't need to hear wingnut tea Partier Mo complain about nobody feeding the homeless, like the Diggers didn't exist).
I loved Velvet Goldmine much more than my deeply closeted self could let on. Cool to see Haynes still going strong.
Dunno how much I like band-centered documentaries, as they tend to be exercises in the mutual gravitational pull of enormous egos (the band's drawing towards the critic/director's) in a bid to argue how whatever band was the Zeitgeist itself. That's why Summer of Soul appealed me so much: it was a wistful acknowledgment of What Could Have Been.
This always makes Serious Music Brahs gasp, but I never had much use for VU. I can see clearly what I owe them as a fan of punk & glam & alt & post-rock, but meh otherwise. Sorry 'bout it -- no disrespect meant.
For me "Sister Ray" will always the name of the giant cannon Shinra builds to destroy the Ultima Weapon in FF7. It only made things worse of course, but it's a good song too.
Nothing frightens me more
Than religion at my door
https://youtu.be/UlWeVY64TpU
Bummer about Angus MacLise. He was a lot more than the VU's Stuart Sutcliffe. The story about him and Loudon Wainwright getting busted for weed is always a surprise. And does Doug Yule get a cameo?
I'm going through a Velvets phase, so this is a must see for me. Waiting for the Blu-ray and hoping there'll be one.
I'll just leave this here.
https://twitter.com/the_ren1981/status/1338767002408800263
All music documentaries should be like "Let's Get Lost."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PGeOZqvISk
Another good one, with a lot to chew on. I think it's virtually impossible to do a rockumentary (if you will) that's not a director's love letter to his teenage self fan, the temptation to tell that kid "you were right, here's why they were so important" is just so powerful. And if they didn't care about the band, you get Behind The Music. I was too old for Velvet Goldmine, and was kind of embarrassed at how naked Todd's love of the artists was as characters in his private fantasy. And I love Iggy and Bowie.
The Lou quote about the Mothers doesn't surprise me, the Mothers were a conceptual band, which would be catnip to an east coast artist, and my impression of Frank is that he was Extremely good at ingratiating himself with people who could be useful to him.
Wished-for: {Mo Tucker's politics} erasure in the film.
I'll use this as an excuse to recommend Kim Newman's "Andy Warhol's Dracula", and to a lesser degree the collection in which it's most easily found, "Johnny Alucard". It's set in Newman's "Anno Dracula" universe in which 'Dracula was not distracted from his plan to take over the British Empire by his affair with the wife of a rural solicitor',and features Lou Reed, on being told that Warhol had become a vampire, responding with 'Andy was alive?'.