Within documentary film, one significant group of films thematically focus on the historical and cultural impact of music. Since they were first created in the 1960s, the rock’n’roll documentary – or “rockumentary” as it affectionately known – has brought a visual element to a traditionally aural experience. These films serve to capture the power of rock music by recording the power of the stage performance, the persona of the rock star, and by commenting upon the significance of the music upon society-at-large.

In order to glean meaning from the wealth of rock documentaries in existence, it is best to limit a study to a small but exemplary core of films. To this end, four documentaries have been chosen: Dont Look Back (dir. D.A. Pennebaker, 1967); The Last Waltz (dir. Martin Scorsese, 1978); The Decline of Western Civilization (dir. Penelope Spheeris, 1981); and The Decline of Western Civilization, Part II: The Metal Years (dir. Penelope Spheeris, 1988). Although limited in number, these films represent the spectrum of rock documentaries. For example, The Last Waltz represents the pure concert film, in which interviews with the artists serve as brief supplements to the raw performance, while Dont Look Back features fewer sequences of performance in order to more closely examine the off-stage life of the artist. Meanwhile, the Decline of Western Civilization films strike a balance between these two extremes, serving as visual evidence of and commentary upon a specific era of music through both live performances and interviews with artists and fans. Before using these films to detail some of the central features of the rockumentary genre, brief synopses of the motion pictures will help provide necessary context.

Filmed over the course of his 1965 concert tour in England, Dont Look Back offers a behind-the-scenes look at Bob Dylan during his ascendancy to folk rock stardom. Directed by notable documentarian D.A. Pennebaker and selected for preservation by the United States National Film Registry (Library of Congress), the film features Dylan’s mercurial-yet-charismatic personality, which, coupled with his musical resonance, ultimately endeared him to the 1960s counterculture. Brief segments of concert footage are coupled with intimate scenes off-stage, where Dylan alternately verbally spars with journalists and engages in hotel room jam sessions with an entourage that includes Joan Baez, Donovan, and Alan Price. Recorded during a particularly prolific period in Dylan’s musical career, during which time he drew inspiration from “folk, blues, country, R&B, rock’n’roll, gospel, British beat, symbolist, modernist and Beat poetry, surrealism and Dada, advertising jargon and social commentary, Fellini and Mad magazine,” Dylan’s social message carried a coherent and original artistic voice and vision.[1]

Structured chronologically, Pennebaker’s film is cinéma vérité at its strongest, providing an intimate look into what the New York Times called, “the life of a folk hero [that is] both entertaining and occasionally disturbing.”[2] Dylan himself is revealed to be a polarizing figure—while Time magazine dubbed him a “master poet, caustic social critic, and intrepid, guiding spirit,” film critic Roger Ebert saw a flawed man: “He is immature, petty, vindictive, lacking a sense of humor, overly impressed with his own importance and not very bright.”[3] Regardless, Dont Look Back captures the power of Dylan’s music and serves as visual evidence of mid-sixties youth culture. Lastly, the film features one of Dylan’s most iconic images, as the opening scene of the film exists as a kind of music video for his song “Subterranean Homesick Blues,” in which the singer displays and discards a series of cue cards bearing selected words and phrases from the lyrics (https://youtu.be/1inL6s1htio).

Next, filmed during The Band’s Thanksgiving Day, 1976, farewell concert at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco, The Last Waltz pays testament to one of the most influential rock bands of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Although not the most commercially successful musical group of the era, The Band (comprised by Rick Danko, Levon Helm, Garth Hudson, Richard Manuel, and Robbie Robertson) was critically acclaimed by industry insiders, and their music showcased the stylistic influences of rock’n’roll—blues, soul, gospel, R&B, folk, and Tin Pan Alley pop are all represented within the film. Joined by a slew of music royalty (Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Ronnie Hawkins, Dr. John, Joni Mitchell, Muddy Waters, the Staple Sisters, and Eric Clapton, among others), The Last Waltz is a multi-camera, edited concert that effectively captures the spiritual magic of live musical performance. Scorsese opens the film with a title card reading “This film should be played loud!,” a missive that the viewer will unconsciously find themselves following, especially due to the subdued audio during interview segments that punctuate the stage performances. Lastly, studio segments of hits “The Weight” and “Evangeline” provide a music video-like quality and aesthetic contrast to the raucous stage show.

Larger in scope than The Last Waltz, Penelope Spheeris’ three-part documentary series The Decline of Western Civilization explores two different subgenres of rock’n’roll – punk and heavy metal – in Los Angeles during the 1980s. Structurally similar, each film includes live performances interspersed with interviews of both bands and fans, and the documentaries serve as commentaries about each genre’s place in society. In Part I, which explores the L.A. punk scene of 1980-1981, Spheeris shows that punk music exists as a rejection of society. Punk artists and their fans are portrayed as nihilistic and anarchistic, and they purposely stand outside of a society that they feel has failed them. Featuring such bands as Black Flag, X, Alice Bag Band, Circle Jerks, and the Germs (whose singer, Darby Crash, died from a heroin-induced suicide shortly before the film was released), Decline Part I showcases the aggressive and destructive concerts that made this genre infamous. Stylistically, the footage is as raw and grimy as the music it documents, and the film offers a look into a subculture that was largely ignored by the rock music press of the time.

For The Decline of Western Civilization, Part II: The Metal Years, Spheeris turns her attention to the L.A. heavy metal scene of 1987-1988. Filmed during the height of “glam metal,” a more polished and stylized cinematic production effectively harmonizes the mascara-, hairspray-, and glitter-obsessed subgenre that stressed theatrics as much as heavy metal guitar riffs. Here, the violence and nihilism of the punks has metamorphosed into a narcissistic self-interest. While still existing as societal outcasts, these metalheads see rock music as a path to personal gain, and the film highlights numerous instances of rock star excess. Famous artists, including Alice Cooper, Steven Tyler and Joe Perry of Aerosmith, Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons of Kiss, Ozzy Osbourne, and Poison, are juxtaposed against struggling acts such as London, Odin, and Seduce. In this way, both established artists and hopefuls give voice to the alcohol- and sex-tinged rock star lifestyle, and Spheeris utilizes carefully choreographed and staged interviews to comment upon rock star hedonism.[4]

One central facet of the rock documentary is the documentarian’s ability to use cinema to comment on the meaning of rock’n’roll or the effect that a particular genre can have on society. Music and song have long been recognized to have a direct effect upon the formation and remembrance of culture, and American rock’n’roll music is no different. In the 1960s, rock songs contributed to the making of a new political consciousness and were infused with civic messages. Chronicling social unrest and societal injustice, the folk and rock music of the decade became anthems for the civil rights and anti-war movements.[5] Put simply, rock’n’roll has the ability to reflect human society and enunciate the human experience.

Reflecting on his early years, Bob Dylan explained how his music held a deeper meaning:

The thing about rock’n’roll is that, for me anyway, it wasn’t enough….There were great catch-phrases and driving pulse rhythms…but the songs weren’t serious or didn’t reflect life in a realistic way. I knew that when I got into folk music, it was more of a serious type of thing. The songs are filled with more despair, more sadness, more triumph, more faith in the supernatural – much deeper feelings.[6]

 

This notion of musical significance is reflected throughout his performances in Dont Look Back, whether through the opening “music video” of “Subterranean Homesick Blues,” his numerous performances of the then-current hit “The Times They Are a-Changin,” or him singing “Only a Pawn in Their Game” while standing in a farm field at a Voter’s Registration Rally in Greenwood, Mississippi. Reacting to the power of Dylan’s message, one journalist in the film, while dictating to a copyeditor, declared: “he is not so much singing as sermonizing.”[7] Furthermore, this sense of rock music having a greater purpose – of being a universal language – is also eloquently echoed in The Last Waltz. During one of the interview sessions, Garth Hudson, arguably the most musically gifted member of The Band, suggests that there exists a spiritual aspect to music:

There is a view that jazz is “evil” because it comes from evil people, but actually the greatest priests on 52nd Street, and on the streets of New York City, were the musicians. They were doing the greatest healing work. And they knew how to punch through music which would cure and make people feel good.[8]

 

Hudson speaks of the healing power of the street musician, the ability of music to cure – or at least provide comfort for – society’s woes. Conveying the idea that music gives voice to a collective experience is one of the most valuable services of the rockumentary.

Even as music became increasingly depoliticized in the decades following the 1960s, rock music still provided the means to put into words a collective experience, and the rock documentary is one vehicle through which to communicate that message. Regardless of how commercialized the rock’n’roll industry had become, one scholar argues that “the particular sense of a generation in revolt against an anonymous Establishment – a generation in search of authenticity, peace, and even collective love – continues to fuel rock music.”[9]

In contrast to Dont Look Back and The Last Waltz, Penelope Spheeris’ The Decline of Western Civilization documentaries provide a very different examination of the relationship between rock music and a social group. Chronicling songs devoid of messages of social justice, her films give visual evidence to an era of rock music that scholar Lawrence Grossberg termed “postmodern rock.” According to Grossberg, by the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s, rock’s claim to an authenticity cherished by postwar youths was gone, replaced by a logic of “ironic nihilism” or “authentic inauthenticity” that judges all aspects of society as equally fake and artificial. In this reality, rock music – epitomized by punk music and its followers – “offers neither salvation nor transcendence…[and exists] without the power to restructure everyday life.”[10] Still, these genres of postmodern rock continue to have an effect on the everyday lives of its listeners.

In The Decline of Western Civilization, which explores the punk scene of 1980-1981, Spheeris’ cameras capture in visceral detail how music has become a collective experience for this small subculture. For both the artists themselves and their fans, the message was virtually identical – these are people who felt as if society had abandoned them.[11] Reveling in their outcast status, their music of choice ultimately reflected their alienation and isolation with songs about poverty, neuroses, and paranoia. A series of candid interviews with punks – washed in sepia tones rather than the vibrant color of the rest of the film – exposes a shared pain and sense of loss, brought on by broken families, social isolation, and hopelessness (https://youtu.be/DUZD1OkXICw ). Faced with this pain, punks channeled these emotions into antisocial behavior, aggression, and frequently violence. Concert footage reveals chaotic performances that dissolve into violent mosh pits and fistfights, some of which even spill onstage. This communal aggression, although destructive, serves as a cultural bond and salve for the community. For example, when questioned why he likes to fight, one punk responded: “It feels good to be good at something. It’s something that I’m good at, beating people up.”[12]

In contrast to the punks, The Decline of Western Civilization, Part II’s heavy metal culture suggests a different meaning in the music. Plagued with the same social isolation and societal rejection as the punks, the metalheads instead channel their alienation into self-interest. Seeing rock’n’roll as the ticket to happiness, the documentary at first appears to be a testament to 1980s-era rock star excess. Scene after scene features the hyper-sexualized, ultra-masculine, and aggressive nature of the heavy metal scene, all of which ironically includes the gender-bending theatrics of the glam rock scene. Objectification of women, rampant drug and alcohol consumption, and luxury expenditures are presented as the hallmarks of the rock star lifestyle, yet, at the same time, Spheeris is able to pierce the theatrics to reveal the harsh anxieties hidden under all of the mascara and big hair. Interviews with established stars candidly speak of substance abuse, addiction, and bankruptcy, while young hopefuls reveal the challenges of climbing the ladder of stardom. One band, London, off-handedly remarks that “We are not role models for your life,” while Paul Stanley, lead vocalist of Kiss, comments on the all-too-frequent death of rock stars: “I don’t think there is anything admirable about a dead legend.”[13] Another band, Odin, rock-star hopefuls who claim to be “weeks from getting signed,” are emblematic of the juxtaposition between excess and anxiety. In an interview staged with the band reclining in a hot tub surrounded by bikini-clad groupies, one member remarks that without the rock star life he was destined “to end up as a bum on Skid Row,” while the lead singer frankly discusses moments of suicidal depression caused by the frustration of not achieving stardom.[14] Arguably the starkest scene in the film is an interview with Chris Holmes, guitarist for the established heavy metal band W.A.S.P. Reclining in his swimming pool, a heavily inebriated Holmes discusses his unhappiness while guzzling entire bottles of vodka. Meanwhile, in heart-breaking fashion, Spheeris’ cameras zoom in on Holmes’ mother, sitting poolside with a pained expression on her face. Even having found success, fame, and wealth, Holmes still suffers from the same anxieties of his less-successful peers. “I’d rather be poor and happy than rich and lonely,” he remarks, and when asked where he sees himself in ten years, he responds simply: “dead.”[15] (https://youtu.be/yUxXO3eSHa0)

The other major feature of the rockumentary is the musical performance. Although listening to music can be a purely aural encounter, actually sitting in on a musical performance can elevate the experience to a new level. Whether in the form of a live rock concert, a prerecorded event, or even the audio bootleg, the improvisational and unscripted performance can enhance one’s perception of a given artist. Musicologists argue that the key to understanding the significance of a performance is to realize the extent to which meaning is shared “through acts of negotiation either between performers, or between them and the audience.” In other words, “to understand music as performance, then, means to see it as an irreducibly social phenomenon, even when only a single individual is involved.”[16] To this end, the rockumentary, through concert footage, provides a chronicle for a musical moment, allowing the ritual moment to be re-experienced in the future. Within each documentary, however, the documentarian can direct the visual frame to explore several forms of performance, namely of the artist themselves, of the interplay between the artist and the audience, and within the theatrical performance of the rock star persona itself.

First, when a director chooses to emphasize the performance of the artist, the camera frequently focuses solely on the stage as a whole or on a single performing member. In doing so, the camera captures the power of the rock’n’roll performance, as expressed through the music and channeled directly to the audience by the performer. Several examples of this method are found in The Last Waltz. For both Van Morrison’s performance of “Caravan” (https://youtu.be/vJXVD-nSSKE) and Muddy Waters’ performance of “Mannish Boy” (https://youtu.be/E5Sj5tpn-no), director Martin Scorsese centers the cameras almost entirely upon the singers themselves. The exclusion of any other distractions forces the full attention of the viewer to be fixated on the emotional output of the vocalists, and bares powerful testament to each singer’s stagecraft. By contrast, Scorsese’s studio recording of The Band’s and The Staples Sister’s performance of “The Weight” is a multi-camera production that emphasizes the power of the entire ensemble (https://youtu.be/TCSzL5-SPHM). Collectively, these performances speak to the potency found within the various ways to experience a rock concert.

A second form of documenting performance accentuates the aforementioned negotiation between the musician and his audience. Whereas Scorsese largely neglects to turn the camera around to show the audience in The Last Waltz, Penelope Spheeris highlights this interplay in both Decline films. For example, footage of both the Alice Bag Band (https://youtu.be/bWKidzzA2FQ) and the Circle Jerks (https://youtu.be/Ein68odkNPk) frequently alternates between the energetic performance onstage and the channeling of that energy into the audience. In the former, the aggressive and agitated movements of vocalist Alice Bag is mimicked by a moshing audience, while in the latter scene the sonic chaos of the moment encourages Keith Morris, the Circle Jerk’s singer, to fall into the audience, entirely eliminating the distance between audience and performer. An even more anarchic example of the audience-performer relationship can be seen in Fear’s performance of “I Don’t Care About You” (https://youtu.be/RUOdQzesdXs). After intentionally inciting the audience to become violent towards the band by hurling all manner of racist, anti-Semitic, and homophobic invectives, several audience members rush the stage. Fistfights ensue amidst the chaos, and after momentary peace is restored the band quickly launches into the next song.

The final types of performances explored in rockumentaries are those performances which are intentionally staged or contrived so as to uphold the rock star’s persona. These theatrics are created to match the character of the star to the expected behavior of a given genre’s philosophical outlook. For instance, in Dont Look Back, Bob Dylan – cultural icon of the 1960s youth movement – dons dark sunglasses in public and strikes a standoffish and anti-establishment pose when faced with journalists, but relaxes this demeanor when retiring to a hotel room with his friends. Similarly, the punk scene’s nihilism and violence encouraged a parallel performance by its stars. To this end, Darby Crash, lead singer of the Germs admits to intentionally physically injuring or degrading himself onstage (https://youtu.be/jNJnOp_cKoE). Explaining that he would perform destructive antics such as smearing peanut butter all over his body or diving through broken glass, Crash epitomized the anarchism of punk life.

In The Decline of Western Civilization, Part II, Penelope Spheeris is more intentional in staging interviews to express the glam metal image of rock star excess. If sex and money were the stated goals of many performers, then Spheeris ensured that steps would be taken to highlight this lifestyle. For example, interviews with both Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons of Kiss were scripted to emphasize the misogynist relationship between the rock star and the young groupie. For Stanley, the interview is conducted while he reclines in bed with several scantily-clad women, while Simmons’ conversation is conducted within a lingerie store whilst the rocker visibly ogles female patrons.

Theatrical sets and fashion also highlight the rocker’s onstage caricature throughout the film. Here, Alice Cooper represents the elder statesman of theatricality, with makeup, costumes, and a stage-show worthy of any Broadway production. Spheeris draws attention to the cooptation of these behaviors by others, though, especially by the aspiring artists who are all too eager to shamelessly copy their more-successful peers. This act is both considered natural and readily acknowledged – Steven Tyler of Aerosmith admits that he “drew direct influence from the New York Doll’s David Johansen,” and Ozzy Osbourne candidly remarks that “nobody’s original. We all copy off of each other.”[17] The appearance of the rock star persona even applies to one’s off-stage behavior. Remarking on the rock star penchant for hotel destruction, one struggling artist, after lamenting that they make no money, stated that “the only time we ever stayed in a hotel room we tore the shit out of it. It just felt natural.”[18]

As a significant category of documentary films, the rockumentary performs a valuable service. Whether highlighting a specific artist or examining an entire genre of music, the rock’n’roll documentary provides visual evidence of a powerful cultural moment. The creation of the film allows both the artist and the documentarian to directly comment on the meaning of the music or the movement. Additionally, by recording performances of all forms, the documentary also indexes the most natural form of experiencing music. In both cases, the film provides a crucial record of the cultural power of rock music.

[1] Mike Marqusee, Wicked Messenger: Bob Dylan and the 1960s – Chimes of Freedom (New York: Seven Stories Press, 2005), 139.

[2] Donal J. Henahan, review of “Dont Look Back,” New York Times, September 7, 1967. http://www.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=EE05E7DF1730E367BC4F53DFBF66838C679EDE. Accessed July 5, 2016.

[3] Jay Cocks, “The Time 100: Bob Dylan,” Time Magazine, June 14, 1999. http://www.shrout.co.uk/TIME%20Bob%20Dylan.html. Accessed July 5, 2016. Roger Ebert, review of “Dont Look Back,” March 21, 1968. http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/dont-look-back-1968. Accessed July 5, 2016.

[4] A third documentary in Spheeris’ Decline series, The Decline of Western Civilization III (1998), chronicles the late-1990s hardcore teenage street punks of Los Angeles. Dubbed “gutter punks,” this subculture takes the anti-establishment message of punk culture to the extreme, completely rejecting mainstream society. As a result, most of these teenagers are homeless, living on the streets or squatting in abandoned buildings. Although featuring the bands Final Conflict, Litmus Green, Naked Aggression, and The Resistance, this film is not considered in this study as it is less about rock music and more a sociological exploration of a fringe lifestyle originally inspired by a musical genre.

[5] Ron Eyerman and Andrew Jamison, Music and Social Movements: Mobilizing Traditions in the Twentieth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), Chapter 5.

[6] Bob Dylan, liner notes, Biograph, 1985.

[7] Dont Look Back, dir. D.A. Pennebaker, 1967.

[8] The Last Waltz, dir. Martin Scorsese, 1978.

[9] Eyerman and Jamison, Music and Social Movements, 141.

[10] Lawrence Grossberg, We Gotta Get Out of This Place: Popular Conservatism and Postmodern Culture (New York: Routledge, 1992), 237. For a discussion of discussion of the concept of authenticity within the commercial music industry, see: Michael Coyle and Jon Dolan, “Modeling Authenticity, Authenticating Commercial Models,” in Kevin J.H. Dettmar and William Richey, eds., Reading Rock and Roll: Authenticity, Appropriation, Aesthetics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999, 17-36.

[11] The philosophy of the punk subculture, defined by anarchism, nonconformity, and disappointment in social and economic structures, is explored in: Craig O’Hara, The Philosophy of Punk: More than Noise!! (San Francisco: AK Press, 1995).

[12] The Decline of Western Civilization, dir. Penelope Spheeris, 1981.

[13] The Decline of Western Civilization, Part II: The Metal Years, dir. Penelope Spheeris, 1988.

[14] Ibid.

[15] Ibid.

[16] Nicholas Cook, “Music as Performance,” in Martin Clayton, Trevor Herbert, and Richard Middleton, eds., The Cultural Study of Music: A Critical Introduction (New York: Routledge, 2003), 205-206. For a sociological consideration of musical performance, see: Christopher Small, “Performance as Ritual: Sketch for an Enquiry into the True Nature of a Symphony Concert,” in Avron Levine White, ed., Lost in Music: Culture, Style and the Musical Event (London:Routledge, 1987), 6-32.

[17] The Decline of Western Civilization, Part II: The Metal Years.

[18] Ibid.