Sound City (2013)

Who payed the critics

Great Film overall

To all those who have watched it: I hope you enjoyed it as much as I do.

Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

Dave Grohl directed and wrote this documentary. You know, he is the guy that is always playing at least two songs in the best ever list of songs, one with Nirvana and the other with Foo Fighters. And this is a film about Sound City, the legendary sound studio that gave life to so many great bands and albums, including Nirvana, Rage Against the Machines, Nine Inch Nails, Fleetwood Mac, and so on.What starts like a smelly place that nobody cleans but has great acoustics goes through a series of transformations through various crises, the most important one being the advent of digital technology, which also meant its death. But there are so many good musicians that jammed there, rose to stardom there, that Grohl is trying to recreate the feeling and asks those musicians to join him in remembering it all.I know you will hate me for this, but what I liked even more than the love of music that transpires throughout the entire film is the fact that it all started with the Neve board, a sound board created by a very precise British engineer called Rupert Neve. The guy was probably very creative himself, but people describe him as precise. And British. He enabled through science and engineering scores of musical generations.Anyway, sometimes the film is a bit slow, especially at the beginning, where the history of the studio and of the people there is laid out. But then it all is worth it at the end, where you get to see all these old musicians coming to record with Foo Fighters using the reconditioned Neve board, recording everything on 2 inch tape.Bottom line: they kind of repeat a lot that music is something human and must be done in a group to enhance pleasure and creativity, but it's not too annoying. This is a great movie nonetheless. If you like music, you will love this film. If you don't like music, I still think you are going to love it.

I didn't really see Dave Grohl as a documentarian, but here we are. And he did a pretty damn good job. "Sound City" covers a few different things: one, the life and times of the eponymous hole-in-the-wall recording studio; two, the now-legendary Neve sound board at which a plethora of legendary albums were recorded; and three, the debate between analog and digital recording. And it's a passionate fight. Sound City was the kind of place that needed to be highlighted for its place in music history, both as a low-rent studio, and then as a hub of old-school (tech speaking) musicians. And kudos to Grohl for taking on the job. The filmmakers spend plenty of time interviewing (most of) the people that recorded here, its dark times in the '80s when processors were all the rage, and its rebirth when Nirvana exploded after recording "Nevermind" there. ... right down to the day it closed its doors for good, and Grohl bought the Neve console and set it up in his very studio. This was clearly a labor of affection, and Grohl pulled it off. And even though everything about the studio's history is covered, he brings it back home to the very thing that made Sound City a focal point in the first place:That righteous sound board. 8/10

Last week I discovered the only thing that can make flying coach great: Sound City! This documentary resonates well beyond music which is why I liked it from second one. It's not about Nirvana or the Foo Fighters. It's about craft and significance: why we do what we do and how we do it. I came for the music and left with an analysis of the creative process from analogue to digital infused through songs. Suddenly I wondered why I wasn't a sound engineer. A great movie often makes you think outside of your own walls and Sound City excels at that. It's also Dave Grohl's first film, which is astonishing since it so artfully twines together multiple cinematographic devices from interviews, hand-held camera work, use of warming and cooling filters, reconstructions, multiple narrators, voice-over, thought bubbles, archival footage, etc. All of which could have resulted in a very confused production in less assured hands.Little is known about Dave Grohl despite Nirvana and the Foo Fighters. In Sound City, we again see that he really knows how to surrounds himself with rare talents "who have something to say" to borrow Trent Reznor's words. Evidently, he has the charisma to drive everyone to supplement his original idea: telling the story of the Neve console. In the end though, Sound City documents the many lives of a historic recording studio and a feat of engineering, the Neve Console, through the music that came out of them from 1969 to 2011.Nothing feels forced except perhaps the last 30 minutes when new recordings are made using the Neve console now housed in Dave's Studio 606. The making of Sound City Reel to Real, the film's vaunted soundtrack, could have done with a tighter edit. Trent Reznor explaining his use of technology as an instrument was much more captivating. In mere moments, he reached beyond the surgical precision of ProTools and sterility of Auto-Tune to give modern tools an honest assessment away from the good old days of analogue. What else is in it for us viewers? Musicians and non-musicians alike will find inspiration in the views exchanged on a studio that produced a crisp sound when its shag carpeted walls should have at best delivered a dirty sound. Sound City by all accounts was the studio equivalent of glorious flora growing from a smelly trash can in a way that no one can fully understand.If you love music, technology and storytelling, this film will make for a terrific evening. As a bonus, you too may be reminded why Stevie Nicks sure wasn't going to be "the cleaning lady" for long in 'You Can't Fix This'.

It's quite an interesting documentary with a rather sad development. I can see how the first half is interesting and of historic value, but the second part is not short of watching Grohl pleasuring himself. I find it very unfortunate that so many bands made so much money after recording there and nobody had the decency to help them out and keep the place running so other young people can experience Sound City. Instead, Grohl is nothing but an opportunist, who prays on Sound City's misfortune in order to get their unique console for himself. In 2011, after parting with lot's of their equipment the studio leases the space to Fairfax recordings.