From Air Kisses To “Kiss Off!”
While you can read all about the movies, the stars and of course, the endless parties at the Sundance Film Festival most everywhere this week I thought I’d share a different set of notes from my trip to Park City, where a lot of terrific music also filled the chillier than usual air.
Despite my best intentions, I never made it to the Sundance Music Café, the “official” venue where one could listen to Michael Penn (okay, good movie connection), The Bird & The Bee, or Julia Sweeney and Jill Sobule (Jill is great, and hey I was wondering what “Pat” was up to weren’t you?)
That said, here are some of the highlights of what I heard while sitting in dark rooms at Sundance.
The Great Rock and Roll Swindle, Absolute Beginners and The Secret Policemen’s Other Ball are all the work of director Julien Temple whose new film, Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten, is a passionate, comprehensive documentary about the co-conspirator of what is arguably (and that IS the operative term) the most influential rock and roll band of it’s time, The Clash. Of course the music is incredible (especially the very rare early footage of The 101’ers) and the pace makes 2 hours go by all too quickly. Trivial tidbit: Strummer’s soundtrack of Walker was recorded at San Francisco’s now defunct Russian Hill Studios! Rating: Two middle fingers up! (P.S. If I have my way I’ll be doing a San Francisco screening of this film soon, I’ll let you know when and if it happens via this blog and the radio!)