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Extraordinary. Curtis was a BBC documentarian with a decided socialist streak who pieced together seven hour-long films about the disintegration of the Soviet Union (and subsequent rise to power of Vladimir Putin) in 2022 from random BBC archival footage, so that it could all be seen through the eyes of Russian people at every level of society.
Dystopian, creepy, banal, fascinating. A car crash in slow motion.
You can find it all on the YouTubes, with an incredibly varied soundtrack too.
And if you dig this, you can also track down his other earlier work, including âHypernormalization,â a similarly constructed documentary which argues that governments, financiers, and tech titans have, since the 1970s, given up on trying to model the complex "real world" and instead established a simplified "fake world" for the benefit of corporations. Anti-capitalist in excelsis deo. But well worth searching out. đ
Feb 12, 2024
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On a big olâ documentary kick and have been steadily working through Adam Curtisâs filmography.
More than being informative and engaging, theyâre almost like multimedia collage pieces. I read on his Wikipedia that he cites Robert Rauschenberg as an influence and I definitely see and feel that. Beautiful stuff. Great soundtracks.
He goes in so many different historical, geopolitical, cultural directions and somehow it doesnât feel insane or boring or overwhelming. Itâs almost relieving to have someone articulate so clearly the depth of the mess we have made.
Most of his work can be found for free on YouTube/Internet Archive. Proceed w caution, may contribute to feelings of anger and frustration.
Mar 16, 2025
I'm not really a documentary person but this one is like a visual collage. It's made up from actual historic footage and reshoots with an incredible score.
It's the history of teenagers in the US, England, and Germany but it's also about the way young people are shaped by war and industrialization.
It's so compelling it goes by super fast, can't recommend enough.
Jan 15, 2025
this short 1989 documentary about guy debord and the situationists is not only a good watch because of the way it explains and connects debord and his movement with the political films of jean-luc godard, the new punk world of the sex pistols, and the contemporary works of barbara krueger and jenny holzer, but also because itâs vhs texture gives it a very cozy feeling. the fuzzy jazz soundtrack and basebanded narration offers up a perfect watching experience for a cold and dreary day.
Jan 18, 2025
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Hey tyler hopefully this doesnât violate some PI.FYI golden rule
But after nearly two years of writing, editing and arguing, my book about the EP is coming out in May and can be preordered here:
https://hozacrecords.com/product/aifl/
The book is about the origins, history and cultural impact of the EP since these little objects first started coming out in the 50s.
Over 50 of my music biz friends then helped me shape the list and review the top 200 ever released, according to us (ha).
For those of you who are into this kind of geekery/snobbery, I canât wait to hear what you think. A labor of love, as all books are! â€ïž
Mar 27, 2024
âSongs Of a Lost Worldâ coming to a goth listening station near you Nov 1 đ€
The fr FW Me Friday the 13th the world was looking for
Sep 14, 2024
I will fail to explain just how much this band meant to me in the 90s.
So I will borrow from AV Club who did a fine job of distilling it:
âUnwound is the best band of the â90s. Not just because of how prolific, consistent, and uncompromising it was, but because of how perfectly Unwound nested in a unique space between some of the most vital forms of music that decade: punk, post-rock, indie rock, post-hardcore, slow-core, and experimental noise. That jumble of subgenres doesnât say much; in fact, it falls far short of what Unwound truly synthesized and stood for. Unwound stood for Unwound. But in a decade where most bands were either stridently earnest or stridently ironic, Unwound wasnât stridently anything. It was only itself. In one sense Unwound was the quietest band of the â90s, skulking around like a nerdy terror cell. In another sense it was the loudest, sculpting raw noise into contorted visions of inner turmoil and frustration.â
R.I.P. Vern Rumsey.
This is their finest song, from their finest album.
I really canât say enough about the sheer bloody minded genius of this group. đ€
Mar 23, 2024