After a busy day I was ready to fall asleep to a good movie on Friday night but instead I got all antsy. “The Last Ride,” supposedly about the last few hours of Hank Williams’ life, was making me anxious and it had nothing to do with Hank’s plight. First of all, why were all his songs sung by somebody else in the movie? I’m guessing his estate got wind of this turkey and said, “forget it.” Hank was surely more complicated and interesting than the one dimensional Jessie James version. We have no idea how this damn thing wound up in our Netflix queue.
On the other hand, an email from Duane with a short rant about a bad day noted how he washed it all away with the fabulous “Beware of Mr. Baker,” a documentary about and with the great drummer Ginger Baker. OK, he’s a flawed character. Give the guy a break. He is a mind blowing drummer. Isn’t that enough?
Dave Mahoney and I hitchhiked down to NYC to see Blind Faith at Madison Square Garden and the crowd left their seats and we all got as close to the stage as possible when Ginger cut loose. This is primal stuff and this movie gets at the magic. Watch closely as he cries while talking about Max Roach, Art Blakey and Elvin Jones. Watch him smile sweetly while playing drums with Fela Kuti.
2 Comments
Those were my 2 fave moments too.
Engrossing film, brilliant yet flawed character, interesting reaction at the end of the film when the movie maker announced he was going to speak with other musicians about playing with Ginger…