Watching this documentary made me feel more anger than I have felt in a long time. It has been quite awhile since I have disliked someone so much that I wanted to cause them physical harm; Anton broke this streak. In every scene he just became more of an ego-centric asshole then the last. I was also really annoyed by his John Lennon-poser-wannabe brother. What was that about? It’s one thing to aspire and emulate another muscians music, but dressing up and cutting your hair like them is taking it way to far.
Now that I’ve ranted about the things and people I hated about the documentary, onto the relevant part – the music. To me the music of the Dandy Warhols or the Brian Jonestown Massacre wasn’t anything particularly special or unique. It definitely sounded good, but it’s music that (to disagree with the narration) was stolen, not really inspired by the 60’s. It didn’t seem like there was anything that great or unique that they were doing. However, what we heard in the Dig! was only a small portion of their music I’m sure, so this is probably a bad judgment to make.
Overall I thought the actual documentary was very well done – regardless of the music or the asshole songwriters. I was especially impressed with the filmmakers after I heard what they went through to keep the film from authorities after a drug bust.
It was an interesting look at the different sides of two competing independent bands and how they both handled record labels and the whole business of touring, performing and making music.
