Searching
for Roger Taylor (2000)
Oh my God I love new wave music. When I worked in
radio, one of my General Managers told me about how
people like music from their "Oh Wow!" years. You know,
those years when you here a new song and go, "Oh, wow!"
That's how it still is for me. All the music from about
1976-1984 is the music from my "Oh Wow!" years. And
that's still mainly all I listen to and buy these days.
This is the music "searching for Roger Taylor" concentrates
on talking about.
Aaron Barnett, the director, co-producer, and editor
of "Searching for Roger Taylor" must have the same "Oh
Wow!" years as me, maybe a few years later.
This film has a plethora of new wave luminaries in
it. Gary Numan, Gerald Casales of Devo, Stewart Copeland
of the Police, Annabelle (and two other members) of
BowWowWow, Gary Kemp of Spandau Ballet, Lol Creme, Tony
Hadley (who worked with several bands of the era), and
the founder of Beggars Banquet Records all grant interviews.
And they say insightful and interesting things. These
aren't blow-off interviews. This is good stuff.
And there are tons and tons of video clips too: Devo,
Human League, Joy Division, Haircut 100, BowWowWow,
Spandau Ballet, ABC, Talking Heads, Police, Blondie,
New Order, Culture Club, and, of course, Duran Duran
- the granddaddy of video hitmakers. In fact, the Roger
Taylor of the title was the drummer for Duran. He retired
into obscurity in the mid-80's.
There were some old interview clips too. And old footage
in general of folks like Johnny Rotten, Steve Strange
(the London scenemaker who also had a band called Visage
and played a lot of new wave at his "Bowie" nights at
London clubs).
"Searching for Roger Taylor" has it all. It doesn't
even really need the subplot-like quest for the whereabouts
of the illusive Durannie. This, sometimes, distracts
from this wonderful exploration of times past (which
really don't seem that long ago to me). Yet, Barnett
still makes the film work and comes out with a wonderful
capper to the caper. It's beautiful and sublime. And
it ends with a beautiful idea, a great final line that
sums it all up spoken in narration by Barnett. It's
just a great film.
It's funny that the clothes and the hair-dos and the
styles of that time, as revisited here, made a lot of
people, including myself, chuckle at the viewing. They
really were silly times, much more quirky and zany than
we remember. Perhaps it's because we all took ourselves
so damn seriously back then. "Searching for Roger Taylor"
is like looking through your yearbook, if you went to
New Wave High. Here are all the great friends we used
to hang around. These were the days. And Barnett exposes
it all to us with a loving eye.
This is a great film for those of us who were there.
And if you are too young to really remember this era,
it's a great history lesson. They oughtta teach this
stuff at school.
"Searching for Roger Taylor" also turns into an indictment
of the modern music scene, in particular the record
companies. There are diatribes, many by Casales, against
record companies' corporate mentality, film companies'
similar attitude, and the selling out of MTV. It's great
stuff.
Look, these days are gone, man. But as the Who said
so many years ago, "Rock is dead. Long live rock!"
Long live the 80's.
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