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Post by markdixon on Aug 29, 2016 9:02:42 GMT
I had a flick through Mark Lewisohn's "Tune In" book to see if there was anything in there that proved or disproved the 'Mersey myth' that's been discussed in the last few posts. Lewisohn doesn't refer to sailors offloading rock 'n' roll and r'n'b records in Liverpool. He shows that the Beatles were exposed to American records through the standard routes. They tuned into Radio Luxembourg and the American Forces Network, they saw feature films such as "The Girl Can't Help It" and they bought records on the London American label in NEMS.
I did spot one unusual detail in the book. John Lennon heard a lot of Delta and country blues records when he was at art school because he had a friend who borrowed them from the cultural department of the American Embassy in London. However, traditional blues rarely featured in the Beatles' repertoire.
I looked at Alan Clayson's book "Hamburg: The Cradle of British Rock" and I noticed a comment by Denny Laine that casts further doubt on the Mersey myth. Laine claimed that a lot of the Birmingham groups had the same repertoire as the Liverpool groups because they brought records back to the UK from Germany. However, he didn't mention how the musicians acquired the records.
I doubt that British musicians in Hamburg bought many records directly from Americans. It appears that the Beatles and other beat groups travelled to Hamburg to play specifically for German audiences (although American sailors sometimes turned up at clubs such as the Kaiserkeller and the Top Ten). The situation was different in France because British beat groups such as Rory Storm and the Hurricanes were hired to play at United States Army bases. Presumably, they would have had plenty of opportunities to purchase records from American servicemen.
Hamburg was the centre of the German music industry, so it's possible that there were record shops there in the early Sixties that sold a wide variety of American imports (such as r'n'b records).
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Post by markdixon on Aug 24, 2016 20:40:54 GMT
Thanks Mark! Great insight. The previous edition 13/5/68 from The Brighton Festival is also known to exist in colour As far as I know, nothing survives from the "Late Night Line-Up" Valentine's Day special from 1968. I only became aware of the details of the programme when I spotted a review of it on the Guardian and Observer digital archive. Roger McGough performed "Summer with Monika" and Brian Patten read "Party Piece". I'd like to see the Brighton Festival edition from May 1968. It featured another of the Liverpool poets. Adrian Henri was shown performing poems inspired by science-fiction whilst dressed as an astronaut.
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Post by markdixon on Aug 21, 2016 20:22:44 GMT
Thanks for the replies everyone. Steve Turner says it wasn't a Colour Me Pop. Mike Eastman says the appearance was shown as 'video insert' and probably consisted of 2 songs.. apparently their album had just been released and the feature was to promote this. I think Occams razor would suggest that it was a Late Night Line Up feature... in fact the band's website support this with the comment 'The programme was transmitted on Saturday May 18th and was a prequel and 'test run' for the show that followed soon after, "Colour Me Pop "./ Does anyone know how musical guests on LNLU were usually presented? Would they often have musical guests for entertainment purposes only like on a variety show, or did there always have to be some kind of cultural/point of discussion reason a musical act was featured? Just wondering what the likelihood that the 18th May edition would have carried a 2 song video insert by a non chart pop act promoting their debut album. I did a bit of research into the ways that music was presented on ‘Late Night Line-Up”. It was certainly the case that musical performances were sometimes linked to cultural discussions. For example, Charles Lewson performed some Victorian Music Hall songs on the show in September 1967 and he interspersed the songs with short comments on their meaning and significance. I suspect this approach was sometimes adopted when performers from other musical traditions (such as folk, calypso and flamenco) were featured on the programme. ‘Late Night Line-Up” was concerned with cultural trends so it often showcased critically acclaimed pop/rock groups such as Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger and the Trinity. However, it also featured bands who weren’t well-known and who weren’t seen as being particularly culturally significant (e.g. Leviathan). Musical performances were often used as a pleasant diversion or as a convenient way to wrap up a show. It’s worth mentioning how important the introduction of colour to BBC2 in 1967 was to “Late Night Line-Up” (although most viewers with access to the channel would have still have been watching in black and white). The “Late Night Line-Up” team seemed to take great pleasure in showing colour clips from programmes that had been shown in black and white on BBC1 earlier in the week. For example, an edition in March 1968 presented colourful clips from a puppet version of Stravinsky’s “Petrushka” which had been featured in monochrome in the BBC1 schools programme “Making Music”. Pop/rock groups were perfect for colour editions of “Late Night Line-Up” because they gave the directors the opportunity to experiment with visual effects. Katch 22 may not have recorded for a prestigious label, but their album had a nice psychedelic sleeve and maybe that helped them secure a spot on the programme. I get the impression that the number of film inserts used in “Late Night Line-Up” increased when the programme switched to colour. Some of these film inserts were from non-BBC sources. For example, the promo film for the Beatles “Hello Goodbye” was due to be shown in colour on 23 November 1967 (but may have been pulled due to a Musicians’ Union ban on miming) and a colour clip of the Jimi Hendrix Experience performing “Wild Thing” was apparently shown on 6 December 1967. The Hendrix clip was directed by Peter Neal and it later appeared in his film “Experience”. There were also a number of themed editions of “Late Night Line-Up” which were made partly or completely on film. For example, on 14 February 1968, there was a Valentine’s Day special which used film clips to illustrate poems performed by Roger McGough and Brian Patten. I wouldn’t be surprised if that edition featured some musical content as well. Another themed edition of the programme premiered tracks from the Beatles “Abbey Road” album. This episode was broadcast on 26 September 1969 and it seems that the songs were accompanied by a mixture of animation, studio sequences featuring dancers, and possibly some 16mm footage showing the Beatles at Tittenhurst Park during their final photo shoot.
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Post by markdixon on Aug 14, 2016 12:34:56 GMT
There's an partial episode guide on the "Late Night Line-Up" Wikipedia page which gives some indication of what survives from the series. I suspect that the bulk of the information comes from the BBC Infax database. However, details of the lost Katch 22 performance have been inserted into the list.
There were approximately 3,000 editions of "Late Night Line-Up" so what survives is a tiny fraction of what was broadcast.
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Post by markdixon on Aug 14, 2016 8:56:19 GMT
I haven't got a full list of musical performances from regular editions of “Late Night Line-Up”, but I’ve compiled a partial list using online sources:
08 Sep 1965: Donovan - “Universal Soldier”
16 Oct 1965: Julie Felix
22 Oct 1965: Tommy Makem and the Clancy Brothers
13 Jan 1966: Ivor Cutler
09 Jul 1966: Ivor Cutler
01 Dec 1966: Dave Brubeck
20 Dec 1966: Ravi Shankar (performing music from “Alice in Wonderland”)
19 Feb 1967: Duke Ellington
19 Apr 1967: Jimi Hendrix Experience - “Purple Haze”
17 May 1967: Jimi Hendrix Experience - “Manic Depression”
07 Dec 1967: Julie Felix
24 Jan 1968: Manfred Mann
14 Feb 1968: Cleo Laine, John Dankworth and the Richard Rodney Bennett Trio
22 Feb 1968: The Gentle Power of Song
01 Apr 1968: Tim Buckley - “Happy Time” and “Morning Glory”
02 Jun 1968: Cleo Laine, John Dankworth and the Richard Rodney Bennett Trio
09 Oct 1968: Buddy Rich
1968 or 1969: Taste
29 Jan 1969: Don Partridge
c. Apr 1969: Leviathan – “Remember The Times”
26 May 1969: Mothers of Invention - “King Kong”
22 Sep 1969: Deep Purple
16 Mar 1972: The Be-Bop Preservation Society (featuring Tubby Hayes)
30 Jun 1972: Cleo Laine
A couple of websites contain quotes from sound engineer John Wood and musical arranger Robert Kirkby which suggest that Nick Drake appeared on “Late Night Line-Up” in 1969. I don’t know if there’s any truth in these recollections. Presumably, the answer lies in records at the BBC Written Archives.
“Late Night Line-Up” also featured many features about musicians (e.g. Petula Clark, the Rolling Stones etc.) and interviews (e.g. Marianne Faithfull, Ringo Starr, Charles Mingus etc.)
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Post by markdixon on Aug 7, 2016 13:35:12 GMT
Here’s a few ideas relating to earlier posts.
Tony is right to point out that many members of ‘the older generation’ in the 1960s enjoyed (or at least tolerated) pop music. It’s maybe not surprising that the beat era (1963-1966) was the high point of pop on British peak time television. Beat music had something for all the family. Teenagers liked the raucous nature of the music and parents appreciated the melodies and the cheerfulness. However, a notable divide opened up in 1966 between the ‘hipper’ youth-orientated pop acts and the harmless, family-friendly performers. Pop shows such as “Ready Steady Go!” vanished and peak-time TV catered much more for the musical tastes of the parents.
By the late Sixties, “Top of the Pops” was the only survivor from the earlier era. Pop stars such as Cilla Black and Tom Jones had their own peak-time shows of course, but these were light-entertainment programmes. New pop shows such as “Discotheque” and “Lift Off” were aimed at children and were shown in the late afternoon.
Bubblegum music was mentioned a few posts back. A lot of bubblegum music was aimed at children, but it had some of the same family-friendly qualities as beat; it was melodic, upbeat and light-hearted. The Fortunes and the Tremeloes were two groups who made the transition from beat to bubblegum quite easily. Bubblegum bands such as White Plains and Pickettywitch would often appear on family shows such as “The Golden Shot” in the early Seventies.
I think the bubblegum era (1968-1972) is misunderstood, partly because so few of the TV performances have survived. There were a lot of folk-pop and psych-pop bands in the late Sixties who ended up in the ‘bubblegum’ category because they were too light and melodic to be classified as ‘rock’. I can’t say I’ve ever given much thought to Jimmy Young’s radio career, but I looked up some of the bands he had in session on his Radio 1 show during the late Sixties/early Seventies. Many of the names are familiar to me from psych-pop compilations such as the “Rubble” series. They include the Idle Race, the Californians, the Flying Machine, Toby Twirl, Orange Bicycle, Timebox, the Onyx and Dream Police. Many of these bands also appeared on “Discotheque” and “Lift Off” but they seem very obscure now because they didn’t have chart hits.
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Post by markdixon on Jul 24, 2016 16:47:21 GMT
The Creation appeared on "The Five O' Clock Club" on 26 July 1966. Nobody seems to know which song they performed, but judging by the dates it was likely to have been "Making Time", which was released as their debut single on 17 June 1966.
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Post by markdixon on Jul 22, 2016 20:21:56 GMT
I'm a bit late to this thread, but I've got a few ideas relating to the post right at the beginning.
I think it's convenient for many media people that so much pop footage from the Sixties is missing. It allows them to tell simpler stories about the Beatles, Stones, Kinks, Who etc. Nostalgia rock magazines and BBC4 rockumentaries are aimed at niche audiences, so it's probably easier for editors and producers to forget or ignore the fact that many of the bands they love started out in an era before niche marketing.
Rock as a musical genre (distinct from beat, r 'n' b and rock 'n' roll) probably began about 1966. However, I don't think rock music became a distinct marketing category (separate from pop) until the end of the Sixties. For a few years rock was part of pop and pop had always been part of light entertainment. It can be argued that Led Zeppelin kicked off niche rock marketing in 1969 when they chose to release an album, but no singles. By 1972, the whole rock market was firmly established: the touring circuit, the late-night specialist TV programmes and the "serious" rock weeklies.
The Who appeared on "Crackerjack" because it was just another promotional platform and they wanted to sell records. It probably didn't seem odd to them. Lots of more obscure bands also appeared on children's programmes. Many fans of the Creation are unlikely to know that they once appeared on the "Five O' Clock Club" because the footage is missing.
Of course there were plenty of unlikely appearances by musicians on TV shows in the 70s, 80s and beyond, but many of these were probably due to the eccentric choices of producers rather than the result of routine promotional strategies. For example, Pere Ubu appeared on an edition of "Roland Rat: The Series" in 1988. I doubt that many Roland Rat fans went out and bought the album that Pere Ubu had out at the time.
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Post by markdixon on Jul 18, 2016 20:37:05 GMT
The soundtrack album for "Oliver in the Overworld" was released in New Zealand in 1970, so there's a strong possibility that "Little Big Time" was broadcast there too.
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Post by markdixon on May 14, 2016 16:40:26 GMT
Here’s another update.
More missing performances from ‘Granada Reports’
Jun 1974 (?): Performance by the Liverpool Scene
c.1976: Performance by Sad Café
1979 (?): The Human League performed “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling”
1981 (?): Tony Wilson interviewed Steel Pulse
1981 (?): Tony Wilson interviewed the Plastics (Japanese New Wave band)
1982: Performance by the Pale Fountains
c. May 1982: Theatre of Hate performed ‘The Hop’ (this is on YouTube)
16 Sep 1982: Elvis Costello performed ‘Shipbuilding’
c. Nov 1982: The Fall performed ‘Solicitor in Studio’ (this is on YouTube)
1983: Performance by the Lotus Eaters
1983: Appearance by Gary Numan
c. Aug 1985: Feature about Frank Sidebottom
1986: Appearance by Gary Numan
c. May 1989: Feature about the Stone Roses (this is on YouTube)
3 Nov 1989: Feature about the Inspiral Carpets (this is on YouTube)
The Factory Club connection (1978-1980)
Apparently quite a few musicians fitted in a ‘Granada Reports’ appearance before playing at the Factory at the Russell Club, Manchester. This is certainly true in the cases of Iggy Pop (20 April 1979) and Public Image Limited (18 June 1979), but I haven’t got any other examples. I know that the Factory club hosted notable names such as the Gang of Four, the Skids, Jilted John, Ultravox, the Damned, the Undertones, the Cure, the Radio Stars, Link Wray, Simple Minds, the Only Ones, the Tourists, Adam and the Ants, the Psychedelic Furs, UB40, Secret Affair, the Purple Hearts, Eddy Grant and Robert Fripp. Did any of these performers ever appear on ‘Granada Reports’?
Missing performance of 'This Charming Man' by the Smiths?
Apparently a clip of the Smiths performing “This Charming Man” has been lost. This lost Smiths performance was mentioned in a tribute to Tony Wilson which was sent out as part of a ‘TV Cream’ email newsletter in 2007. The extract below refers to “From The Beatles To Oasis”, a music retrospective broadcast in the Granada region only on 3 May 1996.
"PLEASE, COULD YOU GIVE US A CALL?"
When Granada decided to celebrate forty years at the forefront of rock and pop on television, who else but Tony Wilson could they choose to preside over the cavalcade of clips from LIFT OFF WITH AYESHA, SHANG-A-LANG, THE STONES IN THE PARK and - of course - SO IT GOES? The proud boasts of Granada's capacious and meticulously-maintained archives were borne out by the surprising inclusion of Peter Sellers doing his version of 'A Hard Day's Night' (on the original videotape!), The Stone Roses' album cover-generating performance on THE OTHER SIDE OF MIDNIGHT, and mental footage of people spinning on their heads at the Wigan Casino.
However, after showing a clip of himself interviewing a frighteningly young-looking Morrissey and Johnny Marr, Wilson theatrically pressed 'Stop' on one of those big VT machines and mentioned that "one of the saddest things about doing a show like this is the stuff you can't find", referring to the fact that the accompanying performance of 'This Charming Man' had gone walkabout and that if anyone watching had taped it, "please, could you give us a call?". Whether or not anyone did is something we don't know, sadly, but hopefully they did as that kind of honesty is worth a million BBC Treasure Hunts.
I didn’t see “From The Beatles to Oasis”, so I don’t know how much of the “TV Cream” piece is accurate. However, the listing on the BFI website confirms that a clip of Morrissey and Marr was used in the programme. On YouTube there’s a clip of Wilson interviewing the Smiths on “Granada Reports’ on 21 February 1985. However, it doesn’t include a performance of “This Charming Man”.
Did the Smiths appear on “Granada Reports” in Autumn 1983 when ‘This Charming Man’ was released as a single? I couldn’t find any mention of such an appearance in any books or websites about the Smiths. However, it’s possible that an early, regional TV appearance by the band could have gone undocumented.
Any corrections or additions to any of the above are welcome.
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Post by markdixon on Apr 16, 2016 7:06:22 GMT
The "Daily Express" article doesn't seem accurate to me because it seems to suggest that the tape wiping took place relatively recently. I've assumed for quite a while that the majority of "Lift Off" episodes were junked some time in the 1970s. The poor survival rate of the series is similar to that of several other programmes made by Granada's children's department in the early 70s. For example only 1 or 2 editions of the quiz/talent show "Anything You Can Do" still exist and there are very few early episodes of "Clapperboard" and "A Handful of Songs" left in the archives.
There was a Granada regional programme in the early 1990s that ran a series of 5-minute features about classic Granada music programmes. "Lift Off" was featured one week and I got the impression that very little survived of the series. All the footage that was used seemed to come from one episode (it might have all been from the final episode). If all the episodes of "Lift Off" had still existed in the early 1990s then Granada would surely have repeated clips of Bowie, Black Sabbath, Roy Wood etc.
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Post by markdixon on Feb 12, 2016 12:31:48 GMT
It seems that "Sit Thi Deawn" did run for 7 years because it was still being broadcast in 1985. I don't know how many episodes survive. The North West Film Archive hold all the surviving film inserts from BBC North West programmes made between 1966 and 1986. There's no sign of "Sit Thi Deawn" on their online catalogue, because I think it was a studio-bound series recorded on video tape. Presumably the surviving episodes are still held by BBC North West.
"Ballad of the North West" was a drama-documentary series that used folk-songs to tell the history of the North West. There were 3 series broadcast from 1973-1975 (18 episodes in total). The North West Film Archive have 7 film inserts from the series. Maybe the BBC still have some complete episodes.
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Post by markdixon on Feb 9, 2016 20:47:00 GMT
Hi, William. I think I've got the same 'TV Times' DVDs as you. 'Octopus' was only shown in the Granada area. The DVD doesn't contain scans of any Granada region 'TV Times' for January-July 1970 (and there are none from that time for ATV and HTV which listed Granada schedules as part of their 'Regional Variations' sections).
I think it's most likely that Bowie appeared on the 1 July 1970 edition of 'Octopus', although I've got no evidence. I've seen all the Granada 'TV Times' that listed 'Octopus' and none of them included the names of guests on the show.
I can't rule out the idea that there might have been a Bowie appearance on 'Newsview', but I think it's unlikely because the programme was usually 5 minutes long and I've never read any references to musical guests being featured on it. 'Octopus' featured music every week. It was Granada's attempt to connect with the era of the underground press, Arts Labs and free festivals, so Bowie would have been a perfect guest. 'Octopus' was produced in July 1970 by Brian Winston and he was also one of the producers of 'Six-O-One: Newsday' in January 1971. Maybe he played a part in arranging both of Bowie's Granada performances during this era.
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Post by markdixon on Feb 8, 2016 21:45:23 GMT
David sang "Memory of a Free Festival" on Granada TV on Friday the 26th June 1970 (but my source does not divulge the TV show) David sang "Holy Holy" on 'Six-O-One' on Monday the 18th January 1971. David was introduced to Roger Damon Price later to create children's TV series 'The Tomorrow People' which featured a master-race known as Homo Superior and incorporated into his song "Oh You Pretty Things" Thanks for the information, William. It looks to me like 26 June 1970 was the recording date, not the broadcast date, for Bowie's performance of "Memory of a Free Festival". I've checked the TV listings on the Guardian Online Archive and I couldn't see any programmes broadcast by Granada on that day that were likely to have included Bowie as a guest. I had a look at the following week's schedule. The bulletin "Newsview" had a 15 minute running time on Monday 29 June (although at least 5 minutes of that time was taken up by "Police File"). If Bowie did appear on "Newsview" then I imagine that only a very short extract of his performance would have been shown (and it probably would have included end credits rolling across the screen). I'd prefer to think that he appeared on 'Octopus' on 1 July 1970. "Memory of a Free Festival" would have been heard in full and the song would have fitted in with the rest of the show. I'm sure this edition of 'Octopus' was broadcast as planned, because it seems that most of the programmes delayed by the Granada strike (such as coverage of the World Cup Final) had been shown by then.
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Post by markdixon on Feb 7, 2016 11:13:16 GMT
I was wondering if anyone has any information about the two (now missing) appearances that David Bowie made on Granada's regional news/magazine programme 'Six-O-One: Newsday'? This is what I've been able to find so far:
Bowie's 'Memory of a Free Festival' was released as a single on 12 June 1970. According to Nicholas Pegg's 'The Complete David Bowie' the record was promoted by an appearance by Bowie on 'Six-O-One: Newsday' in June 1970. The only flaw with this information is that the programme didn't begin until 28 September 1970, by which time Mercury Records would surely have given up on promoting this unsuccessful single. Granada had a bulletin called 'Newsview' in June 1970, but it would have been too short to feature musical guests.
I think I can explain the discrepancy in dates. I think there's a strong possibility that Bowie recorded an appearance for 'Octopus' (Granada's early-evening regional arts programme that ran from January-July 1970 and which featured guests such as Nick Drake, Love, Mighty Baby etc. ) However, I doubt that Bowie's performance of 'Memory of a Free Festival' was ever broadcast on 'Octopus'. Granada was off the air from 26 May-21 June 1970 because of a strike and when the service resumed it's likely that several advertised programmes were pulled from the schedule to make space for the delayed coverage of World Cup '70. It's possible that the Bowie clip was saved until the Autumn of 1970 and then broadcast on 'Six-O-One: Newsday'. I didn't realise there was such a strong link between the two programmes until I saw how the 'TV Times' described the first edition of 'Six-O-One Newsday' in September 1970:
At this time Granada's nightly look at the North West - the controversy of 'On Site' and 'Campaign'', the music and science of 'Octopus', plus the North Western background to the day's events.
Bowie returned to Granada on 18 January 1971 for his second appearance on the programme (the day its title was shortened to 'Newsday'). His performance of 'Holy Holy' was broadcast on 20 January 1971. He wore a dress for this appearance (similar to the one he wore on the cover of 'The Man Who Sold The World').
Other music guests on 'Newsday'
It's likely that 'Newsday' featured many more now lost appearances by other notable musical guests. I know that Gene Vincent performed 'Sunday Morning Comin' Down' on 23 September 1971 (his final ever TV appearance). The Electric Light Orchestra appeared, probably in 1973 shortly before the programme was replaced by 'Granada Reports'.
There are a few surviving performances. I think the British Film Institute hold a complete edition of 'Newsday' from 25 March 1971 which features a song by Ralph McTell. The BFI also hold 19 minutes of film inserts from an edition from 17 November 1970, but I don't know if this includes any musical material.
ITN Source hold 'pop promo' type clips of the Flirtations at the speedway track at Belle Vue, Manchester (14 May 1971) and the Troggs performing 'Lazy Weekend' on a barge on a canal (01 Jun 1971).
There are also a number of 'Newsday' music-related features listed on ITN Source. These include coverage of the Bickershaw Pop Festival in Lancashire in May 1972 (including a brief clip of Country Joe McDonald performing 'Not So Sweet Martha Lorraine' and an interview with Jerry Garcia).
I know that Captain Beefheart was interviewed for a Granada programme on the opening night of his art exhibition at the Bluecoat Arts Centre, Liverpool. This was in April 1972. There's some mystery about which programme featured the interview, but I think that it was 'Newsday' (the only other possibility is 'What's On', which at that stage was a weekly 10-minute programme presented by Harry Davis). The interview isn't listed on ITN Source, but I know it exists because a segment was featured in the 1997 BBC2 documentary 'The Artist Formerly Known As Captain Beefheart'.
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