Keith Richards: Under the Influence

The drunk chuckle of Keith Richards makes me smile. This wasn't so much a documentary about Keith, but more about his music influences. If you're a guitarist or big fan of the blues, then you'll probably love this. If not, then you may find it a bit underwhelming as I did in parts.

The first half was a bit like hanging around a music store as guitarists talked about their instruments and recording techniques. I did enjoy hearing how 'Street Fighting Man' came about in the studio though.

The sheer scope of different genres and musical influences on Keith was impressive, as was his sheer love for music and rock n roll itself. The reggae and country segments were particularly interesting - as for me, the Stones were my stepping stone into the whole country genre.

Have you ever wanted to see Keith Richards and Chuck Berry argue? Well this is your chance. I also had no idea about Keith's proficiency on a piano - was great to see him playing!

By the end, you feel like you've been hanging out with Keith and he starts to feel like a good friend. A brief touching moment on family and love was a nice way to wrap things up.

If you've always just thought of Keith as a pirate or drunkard, then watch this to get a better understanding of the man and how gifted a musician he is - we need to appreciate these music legends while they're still around!

"Under the Influence" is an intimate portrait of Keith Richards, the music lover. It is highly recommended to Rolling Stones fans and music aficionados. After over fifty years of Richards's career in pop music, this is the film that finally describes the music that made the man avoiding all the sex, drugs and rock'n'roll gossip. It is a significant and welcomed change from decades of accounts tainted by a meaningless narrative of debauchery that satisfied the lowest of rock'n'roll fans' desires and kept many others hungry for good and true music story. The 81 minutes of the film go very fast in a journey that brings the viewer through the main genres of American popular music: blues, country, rock'n'roll. Richards visits New York, Chicago and Nashville and recounts his fascination for American music and his encounters with the legends that inspired the Stones, from Muddy Waters to Howlin' Wolf and Chuck Berry. The interview briefly covers several other aspects of the musician's work like song-writing, recording processes, solo career and the use of different instruments. The film contains also precious footage of studio recordings with Tom Waits and Richards's house sessions in Jamaica with the Wingless Angels. Richards in his short, sometimes convoluted, phrases conveys all the devotion and deep appreciation for what music can bring into one's life. A strong sense of the passing of time and mortality brings in another novelty for a Stones documentary and makes Keith Richards's testimony somehow touching. Great little film on a great music soul.

The legendary Keith Richards reveals the artists, individuals and music that influenced his music.

Interesting documentary, on a very interesting subject. Keith Richards is one of the most influential and successful artists in music history and his views on music are generally worth listening to. The documentary does a reasonable job of showing what and who influenced him, making him the musical genius and megastar he has become.

Some good clips from the influential artists, plus Rolling Stones clips and Keith Richards solo clips, including behind-the-scenes footage from him working on his latest album.

However, the documentary lacks focus, jumping around and not really making too much of a point in the end. In a way this adds charm to proceedings, as this fits in with the laid-backness of Richards's persona. It would still be nice to have some degree of order though...

In addition, as you would imagine of someone of Keith Richards's ilk, his influences are broad and there is much ground to cover. This leaves not much in the way of depth, e.g. reggae gets covered in about 5 minutes and even Chuck Berry, probably the greatest influence on Richards, is only highlighted through the anniversary concert Richards appeared at.

A longer, more detailed, documentary would have been great.

I've always considered Keith the real driving force in the Stones, now that I'm aware of how important he was to the creation of songs for the band. There's an audio clip here of him crafting the melody of "Street Fighting Man" with his overlaid acoustic guitars and Charlie Watts drumming, where you can pretty much hear the fully-fledged song and Keith then casually says, "And Mick just came in to finish it off...", presumably with the lyric and good as Jagger's lyrics often were, there's no question that it's the riffs which really made the songs, at least in my opinion they did.

Richards is also the only Stone to make a really good solo album, if you listen to his "Talk Is Cheap" and "Main Offender" albums, plus he wrote a really good autobiography "Life" some years ago so far me, I'd rather catch a documentary on him than his old mate Mick.

This Netflix production, as the name suggests, talks to the man about his main musical influences, which in order appear to be the blues, rock and roll, country and reggae music so the film takes him to places like New York, Chicago, Nashville and Jamaica allowing the man to regale us with his love for each musical style as well as inserting some vintage clips not only of some of his own musical heroes like Muddy Waters and Chuck Berry, but also of him interacting with them too. There are some nice anecdotes about how modest Muddy was and how demanding Chuck was although one or two of his other tales appear a little on the tall side.

Of course, he had a new record out at the time called "Crosseyed Heart", so we get to see him playing with his solo band demoing tracks for the album and chatting informally with his band members. Debunking his caricatured image of the drunken stoner, just as he did in his book, I find a lot of what he says quite sage, especially at the end when he stresses the importance of his family to him. It was warming to hear him talk about reconciling with his twenty-years absent father who'd walked out on him and his mum before he became famous. Occasionally he rambles on a bit about the magic of music and it's obvious that he's the main man the way everybody around him seems to wait for him to stop speaking before laughing with him, plus the producer gets his infrequent collaborator Tom Waits to spout a lot of adulatory BS in Richards' name, but Keith definitely comes over as a decent, grounded guy, as evidenced by him stopping his chauffeured limo to sign autographs for his fans.

I'd have appreciated a bit more length and depth to this documentary but you suspect at ten times the length you'd still only be scratching the surface of the man.

An incredibly short-sighted & narrow "documentary" about Keith richards musical beginnings and life.

But the documentary doesn't touch on any of his personal life, ever. At all. For the entire thing.

I just don't know why with that access you would make something so boring & pale about one of the most colorful people in rock history.

The Director Morgan Neville has a history of this kind of fluffy autobiographical film making and he should consider quitting.