According to IMDB, this is actually an episode of Great Performances, but since it’s very long, and not broken into different episodes… I’m calling this a movie.
I came out of this with more respect for Stax than I had, which was already considerable. While Motown put out some very big crossover hits, Stax put out material with less polish, more energy, and more narrow appeal. I did find a handful of Stax recordings that were clearly intended to ape an existing Motown hit, but those are rare, and kind of charming.
This documentary focused less on the music, and more on the integrated atmosphere that Stax had. I honestly didn’t know about this. Since their market was almost exclusively for a black audience, and most of their artists were obviously black (the exception being Lynda Lyndell, who isn’t mentioned in this documentary) it was easy to assume that they were an exclusively black company.
I would have liked a better focus on the musicians, but most of this focuses on events, cultural elements, and the business side of Stax. This is still pretty interesting, and the footage from a massive concert was remarkable. It explained how important soul music was as a community glue. This is something missing nowadays… music is too fragmented to be so cohesive a force.
The business elements aren’t explained in enough detail to be as compelling, but I have the impression that Stax was managed very loosely for awhile, then corruptly for awhile, and both of these combined to make the company insolvent.
No comments:
Post a Comment