Sound of the City: London 1964-73

Rock City (1973)

*** (out of 4)

This documentary, also known as SOUND OF THE CITY: London 1964-73, isn't the most well-produced film and you're certainly not going to learn anything from it but if you just want great music then this is a great place to start. This documentary pretty much shows us the British music scene with artists including The Rolling Stones, Cream, Jimi Hendrix, Eric Burdon and the Animals, Joe Cocker, the Ike and Tina Turner Revue, Pink Floyd, Otis Redding, Cat Stevens and Rod Stewart. Again, if you're looking for a film that explains where this bands came up and how they got their break into the business then you're going to be disappointed because there aren't any talking heads or any sort of interviews. Instead we just get various music clips taken from various concerts and even a few studio recordings. One of the highlights is an amazing version of "Satisfaction" from not the Stones but from Otis Redding who puts enough fire, soul and energy into the performance where he could call the song his own. We get Hendrix doing some extremely hot numbers including "Hey Joe" and "Wild Thing" as well as a third song. Joe Cocker brings down the house with a red-hot version of "With a Little Help from My Friends" but then again I've yet to hear a version of this where he didn't nail it. Pink Floyd gets a couple songs but both of them are edited down including a version of "Careful with that Axe, Eugene." Fans of the music are certainly going to want to check this thing out since there's no denying the performances selected are of high quality and really pack a nice punch. I'm not sure how director Clifton decided to show the clips but things close out with Stewart.