Do You Remember Those Classic Albums Docos?

Friday is fun because it’s about music. Playlists, links…Today, it’s about music docos, a specific series of music docos…

Do you remember those “Classic Albums” documentary shows? They were on TV in the early 00s. They were available on DVD too. The shows were usually about 50 minutes, but if you bought the DVD you got some extras — deleted scenes, basically the bits of the interviews that had been edited out. Lol.

They’re on Amazon Prime now, many of them. And a few of them are up in full on YouTube. Or else in bite-sized chunks.

Once a year or so, I’ll watch the Steely Dan Aja one in its entirety. It’s a mere bonus that it happens to be an album I love by a band I adore, it’s also filled with smug comedy (as are so many of their songs). And you can see the likes of Chuck Rainey, Bernard Purdie, and Steve Gadd recreating their parts for the camera. Walter (R.I.P.) and Donald are behind the mixing desk, and are the only ones allowed in on the jokes they write. It’s wonderful. Maybe it’s infuriating. But why not both? I love it.

Same goes for the Stevie Wonder one about Songs In The Key of Life. I love this album more than most records by most artists, and it’s absolutely my favourite Stevie Wonder album. And you watch this, again, to see all the great musicians, and to watch Stevie behind the drums, or at the keys. A genius.

Phil Collins’ Face Value is another I’ve watched more than once. One I recently purchased on DVD in fact — for when I next want to view it all the way through. It’s packed with great clips from the archive, and it’s just one of the many Phil Collins docos you can watch — though at least one person is going to tell me that Phil Collins is everything that’s wrong with music, or some other such nonsense. The man is a legend. And one of the greatest drummers to ever do it; certainly the most famous singing drummer — and I am unashamedly a fan of most of his music.

But maybe my absolute favourite from the series is The Band’s The Band — the doco that explores their self-titled, sophomore album. It’s one of my favourite records, sure, but also, it’s just something special to watch Levon Helm on camera; to hear him explaining that it’s actually easier to sing and drum at the same time if anything (so there you go, if you really do hate Phil Collins but love the idea of singing-drummers, I got you covered). Good lord, but I love The Band. And that album (The Band) feels like it was beamed in from space. It’s so great to hear them being talked up by George Harrison and Bernie Taupin and Eric Clapton, and to recognised what those people took from The Band.

I reckon the one about Iron Maiden’s The Number of the Beast actually helped me to fully appreciate the album. I’d heard it, and a few other Maiden records, but it was this film that made me listen again, made me take it a bit more seriously.

And then of course there are the ones about Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours and U2’s Joshua Tree and Metallica’s “Black Album” and Paul Simon’s Graceland and Jimi Hendrix’s Electric Ladyland. In each case, I probably learned nothing, possibly felt like I could have consulted on those entries, or drawn them from memory, but I still loved them.

I sure got a lot out of watching the Bob Marley Catch A Fire one. And that’s another that I’ve returned to. It’s part of any reappraisal, re-appreciation of Marley’s catalogue for me; as important as listening to the actual album.

And, wow, the Lou Reed one, the Pink Floyd one, the Elvis Presley one, the Def Leppard one…I actually enjoy all of those more than I enjoy the albums, which, in each case I absolutely adored at least at some point, but I don’t really need to ever hear those particular records again. I thrashed them. The docos though…I’d happily sit down with them again almost at any time.

The one about Peter Gabriel’s So is so good it inspired me to write sharing the story (see above), taken directly from that doco, about the making of the song Don’t Give Up. A song that has resonated with me since I was a child.

Here’s the full list of these docos.

So many gems. Lennon’s Plastic Ono Band, the early Grateful Dead records, Frank Zappa, Cream, Tom Petty, The Beach Boys. Geez, even the one about Rush is downright enjoyable (documentaries about Rush are always enjoyable, it’s just the actual music that sucks).

The only problem in all of this is, like anything about rock that has the word ‘classic’ for added, erm, value, it ends up being a giant sausage-fest.

I caught up with the Carly Simon doco (No Secrets) only fairly recently (it is a more recently-created title, 2017). It’s bloody good too.

But the series really needed more than just this very-late lip service. There’s one made about Amy Winehouse’s Back To Black, but every film made about Amy Winehouse feels sad and is usually exploitative in some way.

Anyway, it would be have been nice to see a bit more outside of the usual suspects. But I can’t help but feel very nostalgic thinking about these docos. I was well on my way to being a giant bore without them. But they probably helped in tipping me right over the edge and into cliche.

And I was just thinking about them today. How I have rewatched them more than any other docos, certainly than any other series of films. So what about you? Any fans out there? Any specific titles within the series you absolutely loved? And what album do you wish they had covered? I’d have gone for something about Split Enz’s Mental Notes or True Colours eh!

And because it’s Friday, and you deserve a playlist, I’m not going to let you down. It’s volume 180 after all!