“I’m not the son of God. I’m not Lucifer. I’m not the Devil.” – Paul “H.R.” Hudson
This quote starts off Bad Brains: A Band in D.C. and H.R. is called many unsavory things over the course of the film: “insane,” “a joke” and “Black Judas” among them—and that’s just from his bandmates. However, he’s also “what a frontman should be,” and through a series of interviews, illustrated anecdotes and archival footage, directors Mandy Stein and Benjamin Logan seem to come to the conclusion that he is all of these things.
The camera crew is set to follow Bad Brains around on their 2007 tour, their first in a decade, and as such, there are many scenes that one would expect to see in a tour documentary. Happy crowds, fan photo-ops and tour-bus relaxation backed by some of Bad Brains’ more blissful reggae-punk numbers. However, there are also shots of the band getting locked out of their van in Europe and many wherein the camera captures H.R.’s eccentricities. In fact, that focus often betrays the filmmakers’ attempt to suspend judgement on Bad Brains’ enigmatic frontman. They insert a graphic of an arrow onscreen with the words “Bulletproof Vest ?!,” demonstrating that the viewer did see H.R. don what we think he did before a set in Canada. “It cannot go perfectly smoothly,” says band manager Anthony Countey at the beginning of the tour.
However, the oral history that punctuates the shots of their 2007 tour suggest that it never has gone perfectly smoothly. The film is filled with glowing endorsements of Bad Brains shows and albums from the likes of Dave Grohl, Henry Rollins, Ian MacKaye and the late Adam Yauch, who called Bad Brains’ debut LP the best hardcore punk album of all time. However, the interviews with guitarist Gary “Dr. Know” Miller and bassist Darryl Jenifer speak to grittier stories of stolen equipment, police encounters and slinging weed in New York. The film also touches on the controversial encounter with Austin punk band Big Boys. While the film spends an almost dismissively short amount of time on the encounter, the filmmakers do include a debate between Jenifer and MacKaye as to whether H.R. deserved the homophobic stigma.
Local viewers will delight in pointing out the local landmarks that pepper the film. Washington stars in this film as much as the four members of Bad Brains. We see them backstage at the 9:30 Club and talking with Crooked Beat Records’ Bill Daly. However, the most poignant shots in D.C. come from a now condemned house in Southeast where the band recorded its first tape.
What makes many of these stories more vivid in the absence of archival footage are the fantastic illustrations of Rita Lux. Lux and animator Grant Nellessen actually provide some of the most interesting visuals of the film outside of H.R.’s backflips. Regardless of how familiar the audience is with the myth and the music of Bad Brains, viewers will come out of the theater intrigued to pore through their catalogue—even if they do not come out convinced that they should see Bad Brains’ next live show.
Screens tonight at 10:45 p.m. and Saturday, June 23 at 10 p.m. Both showings at the AFI Silver Theatre 1.
