Amazing Grace: Jeff Buckley
There was one movie at the Boston Independent Film Festival that I really had to catch. My friend Don introduced me to Jeff Buckley back in ‘94 with his album Grace. I can’t think of any other artist that is so striking that I remember the introduction. Riding is the car with Don and him saying “You’ve got to check this guy out… it’s amazing.” Indeed! If the grunge rock of the early 90’s helped us get in touch with our angst… Buckley was the more sophisticated aftermath that was going to help us reach everything else.
The music moves.
I promptly bought the album.
When I heard in ‘97 that Buckley had drowned in the Mississippi river in Memphis I was instantly saddened. No more music from Jeff Buckley (Grace was his only full length production album.) No chance, ever, to see him live.
So when I saw that the final day of Boston’s Indie Film Festival was showing a documentary on his life, I had to take this opportunity to see him. My sister, Lex, although unfamiliar with Buckley, agreed to come with. We arrived 20 minutes in advance of the scheduled screening and purchased the very last two tickets for the show. Waiting in the long line in the alley alongside the theatre allowed us to observe some of the film festival buzz. Many people had badges dangling from their necks, stamped with ‘Volunteer’ or ‘Film Maker’. Many people arrived too late to get a ticket.
The movie was good, although it left me with a nagging feeling that I had missed out. It’s quite obvious that Buckley fits into that strange young-dead-brilliant-artist category like James Dean or John Balushi or Jimi Hendrix or Curt Cobain or Tupac Shakur or…. Why are there so many? The film shows us grainy footage of his early days in New York City’s hole-in-the-wall Sin-E… just him with a guitar and a microphone in a room with 100 people or so. They must have known they were witnessing a singular talent.
There were many commentaries from friends and fans from Soundgarden’s Chris Cornell to Skid Row’s Sebastian Bach. The portions that I found interesting were comments on Jeff’s attitudes toward fame, his organic unplanned approach to the creative process, and his raw exposed emotion on stage. (This last point is nicely corroborated with amazing close-up performance footage)
This whole Jeff Buckley experience was capped by a question and answer session with director, Nyla Bialek Adams. A personal friend of Buckley’s, Nyla recounted a few very interesting anecdotes. When asked how she came to work for Buckley, she talked about how she first listened to Buckley’s EP Live at Sin-E and replayed it six times back to back. She then sent off a letter to Buckley saying she’d work for him for free, hand out flyers, do promotions anything. Less than a week later, she arrived back at her dorm and her roomate said “Jeff Buckley called”.
Nyla also commented that the film was not yet available on DVD and they were hoping for a distributorship. It’s a shame that this sort of art gets such limited exposure. I imagine technology, the internet, changing powerlaws and the exploiters of the longtail will be fixing this sort of scenario soon. Let’s hope that the day soon comes when a piece like this can find its audience with little or no friction.
Upcoming Screenings of Amazing Grace: Jeff Buckley
Coolidge Corner Movie Theatre
290 Harvard Street, Brookline, Massachusetts
617-734-2500
A nice review of the same screening from Andrew Whitacre.
May 31st, 2005 at 3:38 pm
Just thought I’d double-back on your post and let you know I’ve posted an interview with Nyla Adams, one of the directors of Amazing Grace: Jeff Buckley. Hope you enjoy it!
http://fungibleconvictions.com/
January 25th, 2006 at 2:06 am
[…] all. Here are a couple of bloggers who re-cap the event and the film: Fungible Convictions Dykstranet (The second blogger gets me mixed up with Laurie, my partner on the […]