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Movie Review : I Need That Record: The Death (Or Possible Survival) Of Independent Record Stores (2008)


Country:

USA

Recognizable Faces:

Ian MacKaye
Glenn Branca
Noam Chomsky
Thurston Moore
Mike Watt

Directed By:

Brendan Toller


The computer age has brought many changes to our everyday lives. Our entertainment appliances are becoming obsolete. Thanks to the internet, television, music and literature are on a bullet train to Digital City. Those transitions are going smoothly and step by step for audiovisual entertainment (Netflix) and books (Kindle), but thanks to Sean Parker, the Fanning brothers and the early apostles of peer to peer mp3 trading, the music industry made a 180 degrees u-turn during the late nineties, early two thousands. The music industry was an early witness to the success of the do-it-yourself(D.I.Y) philosophy with punk bands like Black Flag and the world wide web almost freed the artists of any need for major distribution, as long as they're willing to work hard enough. The first victim of that? The independent record stores, who are no longer the cool place where to find new music. 

Brendan Toller's documentary can be divided in two parts, which is strange because it's so short (seventy-two minutes). There's the evident love letter to independent record stores, an institution he obviously cherished and is sad to see struggle so much. There's footage of record store owners closing up shop, packing their goods and lengthy interviews with them about what it meant to them. The answers are often the same: "the conversations, the friendships, etc." I get it, it had a warmth that nothing digital can recapture. But independant record stores were not the peanut butter alley of Chocolate Land. They were annoying sometimes too. Many times, I've been treated with snobbery by a clerk who didn't care about the music I was looking for or received snide comments from shopping hipsters because I said out loud I didn't like a certain band. And also, it's not disappearing. It's just taking another form. Vinyls are getting trendy again, online music stores are popping left and right, selling mp3s as well as hard copes. If you're using social networking correctly, you can get a lot more friends from a lot more place and heck, maybe even occasions to travel. The death of physical independent record store is a sign of the passage of time.

The most interesting part of Toller's documentary concentrate on the effects of multiple closures of indie music stores on independent music. Then, the focus shifts from the internet and the music pirates to the music industry, which could very well be run by the most incompetent, thuggish executives in the history of business. Toller's movie pulls a lot of alarming numbers without quoting sources much. But those numbers are alarming nonetheless. Since the Telecommunications Act of 1996 (who was supposed to promote competition in entertainment industry), the major conglomerates have bought most of the independent radios and started flooding the airwaves with promoted artist and they started bribing the survivors into playing their crap too. Which brings us to the old marketing teachings about creating value. If Nickelback sucks, get their record played as much as you can by cokehead DJs and have them yapping about how great and rock n' roll they are and people will believe it. How many times I heard my own parents say: "If they suck, how come they're all over T.V and radio?" You can be conned into liking something.

Overall, I Need That Record: The Death (Or Possible Survival) Of Independent Record Stores is an incendiary, alarmist rant, but I'm not too sure against what in particular. The director doesn't want to point the fingers at the fans, but he accuses the music industry as a faceless entity of derailing the vital spaces of true music lovers that are indie record stores. I was left with the feeling that Toller wanted to deal with something he didn't fully understand or that he wasn't ready to accept. The music industry has been washed over by a democratic revolution. Record companies are losing power and at the risk of sounding corny, I'd say that music is coming back to the people. But the responsibility is also coming back to them. The responsibility of sharing the music and keeping the artists' heads above the water by buying their music and their merchandise. Like in "the days" you know? Just watch the proverbial Hindenburg of record labels burn to the ground as you tap you feet to the beat of your iPod.

SCORE: 65%

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