Surprisingly, there seems to be a music biz worth making movies about, leftover in this decade of the 21st Century. It's almost quaint how you can re-run the tropes of a 70s-style 'a star is born' sort of story line and give it a twist.
Keira Knightly as a singer-songwriter in search of an earnest, authentic expression plays off against a down and out gonzo-looking label boss and producer played by Mark Ruffalo. All sorts of things could go wrong with such a set up and I was dead cared of watching because you can just imagine how awkward a rom-com could get when music is involved.
Spoiler alert, because well, it's hard to talk about this one without talking about the spoiling sorts of things.
What's Good About It
Let's start with the good news- it's not a Rom Com. The bad news? I think it's an ill-formed musical.
In any case, it passes the time nicely enough. Mark Ruffalo's character and Keira Knightly's character don't exactly end up as a couple and that's good enough for me. It smacks of a bit of integrity even.
The handful of songs around which the story evolves are actually good. They're not the kind of songs or arrangements I'm a fan of, but they're surprisingly smart enough to keep you watching and listening.
What's Bad About It
Quite a number of scenes go by as music montage sequences which makes part of the film indistinguishable from a cheesy indie hipster film clip. It's as if the director doesn't really want to delve into the emotional issues, he wants to short hand it with the songs. The songs are good, but the movie-side of things sort of comes off the boil at times.
I also don't buy the band coming together in a matter of scenes thing. I guess it's a personal prejudice based on my own life experiences but bands take a long time to gel even with good musicians playing in them. It's seductive watching scenes where the music just comes together, but it may be the least realistic thing about this whole exercise.
Also, the character backstory of Mark Ruffalo's label boss-cum-producer makes no sense. You can't tell if he got kicked out of his marriage for being a drunk or being obstinate, but then the back story turns out to be something different and then you scratch your head wondering if he would have ended up so down and out. I can handle lack of reality with the band thing, but I can't really handle a character's backstory being this unbelievable.
What's Interesting About it
The film offers up a slice of the discourse to do with artistic integrity and authenticity as a public figure. Being a film, it's busy demolishing the notion that any recording artist in recent memory is anything but confected, manufactured and handled. The music, on theatre hand was making its case for a posture of authenticity hard. I'm not a big fan of these really girlie songs, but certainly I can see how we've come to this point where songs have to be sickeningly earnest and emotionally bare.
There's an interesting bit towards the beginning where Mark Ruffalo's character is listening to demo CDRs in his car and we get snippets of music - and the sentiment behind all of these songs are either bad, stupid or wrong. It is frustrating to be the artist submitting your demo work, but it is also frustrating to be subjected to them. The world is full of unwanted music. And yet the movie progresses with the notion that the world needs more music.
'Lone Stars'
Every album has a flagship sort of song and this song is the central number of this movie. On the soundtrack, I imagine it's the main song they play 3-4 times as they do in the film. What's interesting about it is that it has 4 versions that come and go and they never feel like the same song. This is because Keira Knightly sings her version with a wispy-girly voice in C-sharp and Adam Levine sings his in C with a falsetto in the verse. The semitone difference and different registers makes it just enough to make them sound quite unalike as songs. It took me until the third rendition to realise they were singing the same song over and over again but in different keys.
Up to that point I thought the songwriter had some patterns he liked repeating in his work.
Anyway, there's a really tricky little move in the verse where the vamping is between the IV chord with a major7th and the III chord minor with a 9th; and this obscures the I chord for a very long time. It's quite like 'Flame Trees' by Cold Chisel that way. Very jazz-influenced writing in a way and also strategic in building the interesting arrangement out of fairly mundane instruments.
The chorus is a I-IVvamp until it come to a change the the II chord, but then the II chord modulates to the minor II and then goes to the V. It's really clever and artful songwriting but there's no way it was composed on guitars. I sat there wondering which chord was getting the old major to minor key thing before resolving on the V.
Again, the songwriter was pretty tricky there and it's worth mentioning as one of the more interesting things in this movie.
'Lone Stars'
Every album has a flagship sort of song and this song is the central number of this movie. On the soundtrack, I imagine it's the main song they play 3-4 times as they do in the film. What's interesting about it is that it has 4 versions that come and go and they never feel like the same song. This is because Keira Knightly sings her version with a wispy-girly voice in C-sharp and Adam Levine sings his in C with a falsetto in the verse. The semitone difference and different registers makes it just enough to make them sound quite unalike as songs. It took me until the third rendition to realise they were singing the same song over and over again but in different keys.
Up to that point I thought the songwriter had some patterns he liked repeating in his work.
Anyway, there's a really tricky little move in the verse where the vamping is between the IV chord with a major7th and the III chord minor with a 9th; and this obscures the I chord for a very long time. It's quite like 'Flame Trees' by Cold Chisel that way. Very jazz-influenced writing in a way and also strategic in building the interesting arrangement out of fairly mundane instruments.
The chorus is a I-IVvamp until it come to a change the the II chord, but then the II chord modulates to the minor II and then goes to the V. It's really clever and artful songwriting but there's no way it was composed on guitars. I sat there wondering which chord was getting the old major to minor key thing before resolving on the V.
Again, the songwriter was pretty tricky there and it's worth mentioning as one of the more interesting things in this movie.
Silly Love Songs
Quite some time ago, I hit a moment where I had no more to write about love, in a song. For all the greatness of it, there's only so much you can write about love. The pain and suffering that comes from having your heart broken offers up a few more aspects, but in the long run, one finds oneself unable to contribute any new insight into the phenomenon worth singing about. The'Fuck-Off' song on the other hand offers a lot more hope. And so in this film we see a splendid 'Fuck-off' song - which led me to believe that whoever was writing the songs for this movie was actually quite a deft and experienced songwriter.
Recording In The Streets
I think the idea of doing this recording in the streets of New York thing is a lot better than how it would actually turn out. It's hard recording anything in public spaces. This is why even the most spontaneous live albums have overdubs. So, ten points for the visually arresting idea but it's just entirely unbelievable.
You can record great demos in a rehearsal studio with a couple of good microphones. That's different. Most rehearsal spaces are dismal, dark, unattractive spaced only fit for rock musicians and desperate rats. And it take a really desperate rat to like them. Hence you can see why the film makers opted with the fanciful notion.
I do give it points; it is cool.
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