Never Too Young to Rock

This is a weird curio from the era of glam rock. A talent detector van scours the country looking for pop bands in order to put on a show, eventually locating Mud, the Glitter Band and the Rubettes. If you're a fan of these bands, there'll be some curiosity value here, other than that, forget it. The extreme low budget, flat direction, grainy photography and the can't-be-bothered-to-wait-for-a-sunny-day dullness of the location filming give the production a rather depressing tone, similar to an old public information film, and the laugh-free (to say nothing of confusing) screenplay doesn't help matters. Useless side note - the same production team made the repulsive Gary Glitter vehicle, REMEMBER ME THIS WAY, which I challenge any sentient being to sit through without screaming.

If ever there was a movie that had the words 'tax write off' stamped all over it.

This is the good, the bad and the glam.

In a dystopian future. A young man (Peter Denyer) and his van driver Mr Rockbottom (Freddie Jones) go round looking for some bands to play on a spectacular television show.

The enemies of pop music want it banned from television and some of them try to sabotage the van which can pick up the glamwaves.

Mud are the first ones who agree to go on, they are found in a roadside cafe with some football hooligans.

Along the way they meet The Glitter Band. Thankfully without the leader of the gang who was busy with a minor diversion.

It all ends up with a spectacular rock concert which also feature The Rubettes.

In many ways this is a low budget and badly produced drivel. The horror of glam rock.

How can you mess up Tiger Feet. Well the director does. A sweaty Les Gray sings his classic while a food fight breaks out led by a man called Nosher! People are talking all over the song. They could had at least reprised it at the concert.

Then there is some silly knockabout stuff inspired by The Beatles movies and Goon type humour. This includes Peter Noone in some army training scenes. The story is as clear as mud.

Mr Rockbottom does not even like modern rock music, he prefers a brass band.

Your mileage might depend on how much nostalgia you have of 1970s glam rock. If you remember the music you would enjoy it or else it will just be pretty absurd. I did dig the music and it was nice to see the bands in their pomp.

A young Midge Ure turns up with his band Slik. Strangely the bass player has a look that Midge would copy a few years later with Ultravox.

The first 80 minutes of the movie are very bad. Bad photography (always filmed on cloudy and rainy days)and bad editing (when the bands are playing, there are cuts to another scene in the middle of the song). But then come the last 20 minutes and they are really worth the waiting. The three bands (The Rubettes, Mud and the Glitter Band) each perform 2 of their hits on stage and here the photography and the editing is perfect. If you are a fan of these bands, you won't find better material from that period. So, skip the first 80 minutes and jump to the beginning of the concert. If you like these bands of the 70's you will enjoy it very much.

Perhaps surprisingly, I only came across this film recently, & I watched it on YT.

It was made in 1975, and set in the late seventies, although it looks nothing like the late seventies, as those of us that were there at the time will tell you.

Early 1975 was a musical watershed. Glam Rock was old, and dying. Bowie had jumped ship & moved on, and Disco music was beginning to appear in the charts, from Europe, and from the USA. The rumblings of Punk were also being heard. One year later, Mud's shapeless hairstyles and pink Teddy Boy outfits, The Rubettes pseudo doo wop & white caps, and the Glitter Band's make up & platform shoes would all be naff & outdated. So this movie is the end of an era.

There is a storyline of sorts, although it does not matter that much, it's in the same vein as the sixties movie "Just for Fun", and the nineties movie "Spice World". The difference is that those other films were at least shot on decent film, the film quality here is grainy & poor, making the era look more gloomy than it actually was.

FTR the acting here is perhaps better than one would have expected, although the humour has gone out of fashion, for example it's unlikely that today's audiences would consider football hooligans to be amusing.

Watch it if you were in your late teens or early twenties in the mid seventies, it may bring back some good memories for you. But for others it's just a curiosity piece.

Theme song written by Tony Macaulay (Anthony Instone) a one man song factory having written and co-written so many hit songs (look him up).

Laurence Myers the executive producer has a great history.. check out the Cherry Red Records Youtube Video interview with him.

GTO Records, Bell Records, Rak Records were the big pop labels of the time.

Not an expensive to produce movie but still a lot of fun and a good look back into what British Rock/Pop was like in the 1974-1976 era.