Eric Green - Beautiful Noise
Daniele - 23/05/2008
a short talk with brand new shoegaze documentary director
AAAmusic: First of all, as it’s the first interview we’re doing with a non-band person, would you like you introduce yourself, your movie and what it is about?
EG: I am a Writer/Director based in Los Angeles and Beautiful Noise is my first feature film. The film is about the influence of The Cocteau Twins, The Jesus and Mary Chain and My Bloody Valentine who have inspired generations of interesting bands who incorporate noise into classic pop structure.
AAAmusic: What is the purpose/aim of your documentary and is there anything that led you to work on it apart from the passion?
EG: The purpose was to highlight some amazing bands that I loved growing up who I feel were unjustly overlooked at the time. That has changed in the past few years with music websites and blogs where the power to influence opinion has been widened.
AAAmusic: You collected lots of interviews with different artists from that era; watching them again now, have you found a common line of thought as regards the general idea of shoegazing (the impact it had, how it still lives nowadays..)?
EG: We have a lot of great interviews with a wide array of personalities.
AAAmusic: It's pretty usual to find the whole shoegaze thing rejected by the artists, as most of them would consider it as a ‘tag’ by the press only, given the different kind of music each band was playing at the time. Is it still like that for them, despite the press now calling ‘neo-shoegazers’ today’s bands like Serena Maneesh, Amusement Parks on Fire and many more?
EG: I think the passage of time has mostly eliminated the stigma of narrow-minded press quotes from modern consciousness but somehow some of the phrases endure.
AAAmusic: People like Billy Corgan, Wayne Coyne and Trent Reznor, who are in the movie, have never been part of the scene. What is it the link between them and their music and the underground British scene of those days? Anything to do with a particular attitude towards music?
EG: Billy Corgan, Wayne Coyne and Trent Reznor are great musicians.
AAAmusic: Is there anything you tried to put the focus on after mounting and editing the footage?
EG: We always had the structure but there is always more insight with new interviews.
AAAmusic: In recent years there’s been an undeniable growing revival of this very unique kind of music. There have been reunions by bands who threw seeds for its future development (The Jesus & Mary Chain, Dinosaur Jr) as well as acts that had a primary part in it (My Bloody Valentine, Swervedriver). What is your idea about it and did your interviews help you understand the feelings behind these reunions? Do you think they’re back to grab the attentions they didn’t get more than 15 years ago, or do you think their status as cult bands won’t change?
EG: I could only theorize, I think it’s because there is more interest now because of the Internet and with more interest I would imagine more offers come in.
AAAmusic: What bands would you like to see reunited if you never had the chance to see them live?
EG: Cocteau Twins and Slowdive would be top of the list.
AAAmusic: Back to “Beautiful Noise”, together with Jonathan Caouette’s All Tomorrow’s Parties, it ‘s one of the newest and most awaited indie music documentaries. How hard is it to produce a movie like yours? How tough is it to get publicity outside the indie circuit?
EG: I’m looking forward to Jonathan’s movie. I really liked Tarnation. It was movies like that made it seem possible; doing a documentary on a low budget and it’s the filmmakers passion that draws you in. As for difficulty, it’s been my pleasure working on this film despite the hundreds of hours spent on perfecting it.
AAAmusic: How are we going to see it in the UK and Europe? Will it be screened at any independent film festival? Have you signed any distribution deal for 2008 or 2009?
EG: We are working out our distribution concurrently with finishing the film. We will post info when that is finalized.
AAAmusic: We’ll keep fingers crossed for the release and we thank you a lot for taking some time to answer our questions. Bye and good luck with future projects!
EG: Thanks.
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