(PRESS RELEASE) The world television premiere of Sleep Well, Drive Carefully: On the Road with Death Cab for Cutie kicks off Musaic on Cinema, Starz Cinema’s new monthly music series, airing Aug. 28 at 10 p.m. (ET/PT). Musaic on Cinema is an exclusive series featuring concerts, documentaries, interviews and travelogues, connecting viewers with top independent music.

The Musaic on Cinema series features all world television premiere films with the exception of Gigantic (A Tale of Two Johns). Each film in the series will air at 10 p.m. (ET/PT) on the last Monday of each month through March 2007, and will also be available in August on Vongo, SEG’s new broadband download movie service.

Sleep Well, Drive Carefully: On the Road with Death Cab for Cutie gives viewers a behind-the-scenes look at life on the road as well as provides candid conversations with the band about their creative process and dedication to their work. The documentary, directed by Justin Mitchell, was shot entirely on 16mm film and features interviews with the band members in their hometown of Seattle, WA.

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The inaugural Play it Loud - RockDocs 2006 looks to be very cool. Running from August 2 - 10, 2006 there is something for every rock fan. Presented by the Film Society of Lincoln Center and taking place at the Walter Reade Theater on 165 West 65th Street in New York City, RockDocs 2006 has an amazing array of cool documentaries including Glastonbury by Julien Temple, loudQUIETloud: A Film about the Pixies, Everyone Stares: The Police Inside Out, the big screen debut of Martin Scorcese’s bio on Bob Dylan and You’re Gonna Miss Me, a film about the legendary and slightly warped Roky Ericson of 13th Floor Elevators fame and many more.

The full listing of films can be found here.

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Attention all you garage rock hipsters and fuzz guitar fiends! After years of hard work, "The Knights of Fuzz: the garage & psychedelic
music explosion 1980 to now" DVD is ready for release!

The video portion of the feature-length DVD features a new scene documentary
with rare footage, 20 newly restored music videos, bonus footage, and
interviews. This first volume includes the scenes in the U.S. & Canada. The
bonus DVD-ROM content (viewed through your computer Web browser) includes
the entire contents of the now out-of-print 300-page KNIGHTS OF FUZZ book,
plus a 26-song audio compilation, hundreds of new feature articles and
reviews, a new photo section, fanzine reproductions, and historical updates.

A worthy addition to any rock and roll fanatics DVD collection.

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All summer long there are some cool free films at 7 Dudley Cinema in Venice, California showing things the way they used to be. Check out the Dumb Angel website for more details.
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Aversion reports that Antagonist Records has released Punk Rock Film School on DVD for all of you budding laptop directors. Sounds interesting.
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The annual "Don’t Knock the Rock" Film Festival is coming to The Redcat Theatre in Downtown Los Angeles this June 29th - July 3rd, 2006. This year’s edition features the world premiere of  "Ghost on the Highway: A Portrait of Jeffrey Lee Pierce and the Gun Club." The line-up also features Under the Covers, We Jam Econo, Monks: Transatlantic Feedback, You’re Gonna Miss me: Concerning Roky Erikson, the great lost vocalist of rock & roll, and his mother Evelyn, The Last Record Store, High and Dry (Where the Dessert Meets Rock & Roll and many more. Check out their website for all the details.

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The 5th Annual Indie Music Video Festival kicks off at NXNE on June 9th, 2006 at the NFB Cinema on 150 John Street in Toronto. There are a ton of cool and innovative videos that you probably won’t see on MTV or Much Music so check them out here.
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Billed as the “first electric western,” “Zachariah” is definitely not your typical cowboy movie. This becomes evident right from the opening credits, when close-ups of an electric guitar and drum kit are flashed between scenes of a rider racing across the desert. A couple of minutes later, The James Gang (the one fronted by Joe Walsh, not Jesse and Frank) is shown rocking out in the middle of nowhere. The incongruity of electric instruments and rock and roll in the Old West is never explained, but who cares? “Zachariah” is not the least bit concerned with historical accuracy, and that’s what makes it such a quirky, amusing, over-the-top artifact of early seventies pop culture.

Released in 1971 and mostly written by The Firesign Theater, “Zachariah” takes place in an Old West where people say, “Far out” and “Right on,” the saloon girls are go-go dancing hippie chicks, and Job Cain, the baddest gunfighter of them all (played with smoldering, steely-eyed menace by legendary jazz drummer, Elvin Jones in his only film role), sits down at a drum kit and delivers a breathtaking solo after vanquishing a foolhardy challenger. It’s an Old West where the most notorious outlaw gang, The Crackers, is also a rock and roll band played by Country Joe and the Fish, who perform a couple of whimsical songs about life as stoned out, rockin’ outlaws who “play better than they rob,” and demonstrate an unexpected flair for slapstick comedy. In fact, The Crackers are so inept at crime that the amount of the reward for their capture keeps dropping throughout the movie.

The story is essentially about a farm boy named Zachariah (John Rubenstein) and his best friend, Matthew (a very boyish looking Don Johnson in one of his first films), who become quite proficient at the fast draw and decide to seek adventure by becoming gunfighters and outlaws. Along the way, they join up briefly with The Crackers, encounter Job Cain at his saloon where only gunfighters are allowed to hang out and The James Gang is the house band, and ultimately part ways because of philosophical differences. Zachariah becomes disillusioned with violence and decides to pursue a life of peace while Matthew wants to challenge Job Cain and take his place as the fastest gunfighter in the West. They meet up again at the end for a climactic showdown, but you’ll have to watch the movie to find out how it all ends.

Other notables in the somwhate off-beat cast are The New York Rock Ensemble, Cajun fiddler Doug Kershaw who, not surprisingly, plays a character called The Fiddler and displays a wild-eyed intensity that makes him seem like a cross between Marty Feldman and Ernest T. Bass, and even, very surprisingly, Dick Van Patten in a brief role as a slick talking used horse and buggy salesman called The Dude. While “Zachariah” is not a great movie in the technical sense by any means, it’s great, low budget cinematic fun, even if it occasionally gets heavy-handed with its messages.

Unfortunately, “Zachariah” is almost impossible to find as a rental and it’s unlikely to be shown anywhere on TV, so if you want to see it you will probably have to buy it. It’s currently available through Amazon.com for about $14 including postage.

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Currently in post-production, Punk’s Not Dead is a new independent documentary tracing the punk rock scene from 1975 to today. According to the site: "Punk’s Not Dead takes you into the sweaty underground clubs, backyard parties, recording studios, and yes, shopping malls and stadium shows where punk rock music and culture continue to thrive". Featuring imterviews and live performances by The Addicts, Sum 41, UK Subs, Subhumans, Bad Religion, Rancid, Exploited, NOFX, The Used, Social Distortion, TSOL, Dead Kennedys, MC5, Sham 69, Youth Brigade, Tsunami Bomb, The Business, The Ramones, Green Day, Anti-Flag, GBH, The Damned and more, it is scheduled to be released by the end of summer. Sounds cool to me!
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According to The Day and Rock, controversial psychedelic ’60s film The Committee is being released on DVD with the soundtrack performed by none other than the Pink Floyd (that’s right, they were still using "the" in their name). It has been quite the bounty for Pink Floyd fans lately. First Roger Waters rejoins the boys at Live 8 and now rare and unavailable Pink Floyd is available on your DVD player at home. Set the controls for the heart of the sun….
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2005 marks a return of the Mods and Rockers Film Festival after a one year sabbatical and as usual, festival founder and Beatles expert Martin Lewis has put together an interesting bill. Taking place at The Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood: Tuesday July 5th - Sunday July 17th and at The Aero Theatre in Santa Monica: Friday July 8th - Sunday July 10th, the festival kicks off with a bang on July 5th with a salute to the pioneers of American rock ‘n’ roll movies featuring the double feature of “Rock around the Clock” and Don’t Knock the Rock” with a special appearance by the actual Comets. From there there is a great assortment of the cool, the obscure and the more well known rock and roll flicks featuring a rare showing of Danger: Diabolik, Blow Up, The Million Eyes Of Sumuru, Angel, Angel, Down We Go (a.k.a. Cult Of The Damned), Mary Jane, The Love Machine, Petulia and the outrageous Can Hieronymus Merkin Ever Forget Mercy Humpee And Find True Happiness?. The festival will also be airing “A Hard Day’s Night” in celebration of Ringo Starr’s 65th birthday and the "Directors Cut" version of Woodstock amongst others. Check out the Mods and Rockers website for the full festival listing and showtimes and make the effort to go if you are in the area. It sounds totally boss!
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I am a Star Wars geek, I’ll admit it. I love the films, the merchandise, the books and video games, the whole kit and kabootle and if I wasn’t leaving at the crack of dawn on Friday for my fishing trip I would be there tonight at the first midnight showing of “Revenge of the Sith” with all the other fans so to say that I’m looking forward to Episode 3 is an understatement. If you are a fan you will want to check out Streaming Soundtracks as they will be streaming Star Wars soundtrack music all day on May 19th, 2005. You will be clicking on that link May 19th, you will be! (Courtesy of the always amazing The Force.Net, the ultimate Star Wars web destination).
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As an old school skateboarder (remember Powell boards, Kryptonite and Simms wheels and Tracker Trucks? Still got ‘em!) looking at the line-up for the soundtrack to the upcoming Lords of Dogtown movie made my heart go all pitter patter. I mean Foghat, Deep Purple and Iggy Pop all on one record? I know it’s all nostalgia but that’s damn cool! Plus it features Social Distortion and Rise Against for the young guns so we can all be happy. Excuse me while I dig up my old Sabbath records.
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I saw this on the great Revola Yahoo group and thought I would share it with you. Àngel Maeztu i Coso posted a very cool looking list of Spanish ’60’s music movies that would be definitely interesting to check out:

A selected filmography of Spanish ’60s music movies

1965
MEGATÓN YE-YÉ (Jesús Yagüe, 1965), featuring Micky Y Los Tonys, Juan Erasmo "Mochi" and Los Shakers. 77 minutes. Black & white.

1966
ÚLTIMO ENCUENTRO (Antonio Eceiza, 1966), featuring Los Shakers. 76 minutes. Black & white.

1967
LOS CHICOS CON LAS CHICAS (Javier Aguirre, 1967), featuring Los Bravos. 77 minutes. Colour.
CODO CON CODO (Víctor Auz, 1967), featuring Bruno Lomas, Massiel and Micky Y Los Tonys. 79 minutes. Colour.

1968
CANTANDO A LA VIDA (Angelino Fons, 1968), featuring Massiel. 91 minutes. Colour.
¡DAME UN POCO DE AMOOOR…! (José María Forqué, 1968), featuring Los Bravos. 85 minutes. Colour.
LONG PLAY (Xavier Setó, 1968), featuring Los Pasos. 90 minutes. Colour.

1969

A 45 REVOLUCIONES POR MINUTO (Pedro Lazaga, 1969), featuring Los Ángeles, Fórmula V, Ivana and Juan Pardo (Los Brincos, Juan & Junior). 97 minutes. Colour.
¡CHICO, CHICA, BOOM! (Juan Bosch, 1969), featuring Bruno Lomas. 91 minutes. Colour.
UN, DOS, TRES, AL ESCONDITE INGLÉS (Iván Zulueta, 1969), featuring many Spanish bands from the late ’60s (Los Ángeles, Los Buenos, Fórmula V, Henry And The Seven, Los Íberos, Shelley Y Nueva Generación…) and the British psychedelic group The End. 86 minutes. Colour.

1970

JUAN Y JUNIOR EN UN MUNDO DIFERENTE (Pedro Olea, 1970), featuring Juan & Junior. 85 minutes. Colour. TOPICAL SPANISH (Ramón Massats, 1970), featuring Los Íberos. 82 minutes. Black & white.

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I have been getting e-mail updates recently about what looks like a very cool film called "Voodoo Rythym- The Gospel of Primitive Rock ‘n’ Roll." You can download the trailer here in order to get an idea of what the film is all about and then keep your eyes peeled to see if it will be playing in your local Bijou sometime soon. And definitely explore the Voodoo Rythym website as it is chock-a-block full of cool "records to ruin any party" (through Voodoo Rythym Records) as well as a great selection of MP3s and other amazingly cool primitive rock and roll stuff to set your heart beating just a little faster. They will make a rock and roll junkie out of you! Highly recommended.
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Rolling Stone magazine has just released the results of a poll naming "This is Spinal Tap" (one of my personal all time favourite films) as the best rock movie ever made according to Contact Music. Here is the list:

1. THIS IS SPINAL TAP
2. A HARD DAY’S NIGHT
3. SID + NANCY
4. HIGH FIDELITY
5. ALMOST FAMOUS UNTITLED: THE BOOTLEG CUT
6. VELVET GOLDMINE
7. DESPERATELY SEEKING SUSAN
8. HEDWIG + THE ANGRY INCH
9. ROCK ‘N’ ROLL HIGH SCHOOL
10. 24 HOUR PARTY PEOPLE

In a related poll The Band’s “Last Waltz" beat the Talking Heads’ “Stop Making Sense” and the Rolling Stones’ “Gimme Shelter” for best rock concert DVD. I am trying to get my hands on a link to these polls, especially the live DVD poll because, while important in overall rock and roll history I find “The Last Waltz” to be quite boring. “Woodstock” might be a better choice. And what the hell is “Desperately Seeking Susan” doing on a list of rock films? How about the phenomenal “Dig” or “The Rose” or "Head"? I could go on. What’s your take?Later.

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If you want an insight into the making of what looks like a very cool indie rock, psychedelic horror film then check out the site for the upcoming film The Miskatonic Acid Test. Currently filming in Maine and Massachusets, the feature-length film "combines psychedelic rock with cosmic horror concepts pioneered by the writer H.P. Lovecraft, mixing in a good bit of philosophy, antiwar politics, and humor along the way." The site has all kinds of cool things to download including a trailer and what is promised to be an increasing bunch of very cool MP3s as music is an important component of the film. Grab the popcorn and head out to the site for a tour. The Miskatonic Acid Test will hopefully be coming to a theatre near you.
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If you are looking for something to do this weeken then head over to the 12th Annual New York Underground Film Festival to catch one or both screenings of the legendary film Captain Milkshake. It will be screened on March 11th (tonight at 11:00 PM) and again on March 14th. Filmed in 1969 as an anti-Vietnam film and banned by the U.S. military, Captain Milkshake is the story of "free love, cheap grass and anti-war protests at Berkeley." It’s quite the trip. Check out the trailer:

Windows Media: Broadband or 56K
Quicktime: Broadband or 56K

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Mojo Magazine are planning a film festival this spring and they are looking for your help in completing the inaugural festival’s lineup. Already confirmed for the film fest are The Who’s "Tommy", "Head" by The Monkees, Robert Altman’s "Nashville", and "24 Hour Party People." In addition they have confirmed an exclusive airing of the Ringo Starr directed T Rex documentary "Born to Boogie." It all takes place May 28-29, 2005 but they are looking to complete their lineup so if you have any suggestions just send them in via their special film festival website and tell them why. I have already suggested the infamous documentary of the Rolling Stones’ 1972 Tour of America "Cocksucker Blues."
UPDATE! The full line-up is up now and tickets are now on sale. No "Cocksucker Blues" and a lot of safe picks but I would love to see "Head" on the big screen.
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Saturday, January 8th would have been the 74th birthday of legendary rock promoter and early riser Bill Graham and to celebrate the event The Bill Graham Foundation is throwing a birthday party at the Filmore in San Francisco and you’re all invited! "Bill’s Birthday Party" will take place this Saturday at the Filmore and will feature a special showing of the "Filmore!" movie about the last days of the Filmore West which has been digitally remastered just for the occasion. The shindig starts at 8:00 PM and there will be cake and ice cream. Tickets can be purchased through Bill Graham Presents or at the Fillmore box office. I wonder if there will be a barrel of apples at the top of the stairs?
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Now this looks down right freaky. Los Angeles based Anxiety Films is putting on their 4th annual Shock-A-Go-Go this year on December 3-4, 2004 at the Vine Theatre. A really wild variety of creepy and weird films combined with cool rock and roll make it sound like an interesting experience to say the least. Check out the line-up of films and the full schedule here.
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If you’ve ever wondered what really happened to Elvis and JFK, a hilarious movie called "Bubba Ho-Tep" provides an explanation that is nearly as plausible and way more entertaining than anything else that’s ever been offered.  It stars Bruce Campbell as a bitter, introspective Elvis with a bum hip and Ossie Davis, in a role that will truly surprise you, as a paranoid JFK who, among other things, is convinced that Lyndon Johnson is trying to kill him.  They live in a nursing home in rural Texas, where they team up to battle the mummy of an evil Egyptian pharoah that sustains itself by eating the souls of the home’s residents. 
The best thing about "Bubba Ho-Tep" is that it isn’t the farcical, slapstick comedy you might expect.  The humor is clever and imaginative, and through the extensive use of voice over and flashbacks, the movie portrays the aged Elvis in a surprisingly sensitive and often poignant manner.  To say any more would spoil most of the movie’s surprises, but if the premise sounds like your idea of fun, you should definitely put "Bubba Ho-Tep" at the top of your "to rent" list.  Just one word of warning–it’s meant for adults, so you may want to watch it before deciding if it’s appropriate for your kids.

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One of the all time classic rock and roll movies "Riot on Sunset Strip" is available at the phenomenal rock and roll video store The Video Beat. This movie has it all: hippies, pot, sugar cube LSD, psychedelic ’60s and fuzz garage punk all mixed together into a rock and roll film classic. Another fine late night movie selection for the true rock and roll film connoisseur. Two thumbs up.
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That’s right the legendary Pre-Fab Four are returning May 1, 2005 on DVD  in "Rutles 2: Can’t Buy Me Lunch." Blimey it’s gonna be fab gear eh guvnor? (OK that was truly bad but I’m excited so cut me some slack!)
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Just a quick reminder that the Indie Rock Video Festival is happening this November 14th and 15th in New York City. Check their website for all the details and don’t forget, if you can’t make it to New York they just might be coming to a city near you.
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