raer soul/funk viddy
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I suppose this question would mostly be directed to those few hardcore people who actually go track down original funky artists, visit them at home, chat, chill etc... I've been wondering, whats the word on the existence of video footage from any of these small time funk/soul bands' shows. From what I know, most of these acts made their livings playing their respective regional circuits, and I was curious whether or not any of that live goodness ever got recorded. I'm sure a lot of it would be w/o sound, but would still be something incredible to see nonetheless. anyone?
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I've been thinking about this too. There really is an unbelievable paucity of footage available of sixties and seventies soul and funk, whether it be obscure groups or someone as well known as James Brown. I mean James fucking Brown and you can barely find anything out there. The last time I checked, the only commericially available footage of him is concerts from the 80s and 90s and I really have no interest in that. At least with JB I know the footage of his prime era exists because there are a number of bootleg DVDs making the rounds. I wish Netflix carried bootlegs. So yeah, someone needs to make a documentary of the good shit...
The !!!! Beat
I am so fucking all over this shit. I just heard about it the other day from my old record store boss, and he says it is ill...some people sing over records, but he says there are tons of amazing live performances, and it sure looks that way. OG Barbara Lynn live videos?!? YES, PLAESE!!!!
i think i found out what my christmas present is going to be to myself.
gotta get my hands on some those..btw i just finished DL all the episodes from that BBC Television show "Soul Deep" i will see if i can put m up here soon.
Thank ye - bookmarked this straight away. I've been spending too much loot on dvds lately, so I'm gonna have to wait a while to get these. Looks really good.
That is the best show out of the volumes I got(I bought #1 and #6), although the group jam w/ Etta James, Little Esther Phillips, Little Milton and several others doing "What'd I Say" LIVE(no lip synch) was pretty hard to top.
I speak from experience when I say that vintage footage of local soul and funk acts is close to non-existent. One reason for this is due to the cost of television production at that time. Video tape was pricey, thus many local variety show producers taped over the previous week's episode to forgo tape costs. Therefore, the only footage that usually remains is the final episode. Nearly every city had a local Black music show in the late '60s and early '70s, which would stand to reason that something would survive, but I have yet to see anything but scraps of these materials.
That said, "The Beat" is really great in terms of quality and lack of lip-synching. James Brown's "Man To Man" concert is available on a bootleg DVD and it's a killer. Apparently Lee Anthony of True Soul Records in Little Rock still has the tapes of his show, the True Soul Express (hosted by Thomas East), but when that might be rescued from his wet basement is anyone's guess.
I was even speaking more in terms of home-video style recordings, ya know? Just one of their friends in the crowd. But damn, nothing? Thats a shame.
There isn't much I wouldn't do to see JB's USO shows over in Vietnam. Mainly because Marva Whitney was looking fine during that trip.
Has anyone ever seen THIS?? Looks pretty good, but I haven't been willing to drop the $$$ yet...
How about THIS ONE?? It has potential, around 1/2 of it is
also have a pretty rad video documentary of The Waller Family filmed by a local richmond va news team. a pretty good documentary! again terrible transfer. nice moments of them eating at their high school lunch cafeteria. all of them wear matching orange sweatsuits with their names on gold chains.
then there is the Starfire video sessions. 1980? 79? pretty awesome stock film studio, no sync, smoke machine, late 70's video effects. awesome for raw vintage disco footage.
some blaxploitation movies have scenes with funk groups in them. quinn harris is playing live in a strip club in some mid 70's flick. forgot the name of it.