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924 Gilman St: Let's Talk About Tact And Timing...
[Alternative Tentacles]
2008; color
Directed by Jack Curran
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While on a personal level I tend to agree more with the sentiment expressed in the ANTiSEEN song "Hippy Punk," I can't help but admire the tenacity of the collective of determined punks who run what might be the most well-known still operating punk rock venue in the world (R.I.P. CBGB's), 924 Gilman St. located in Berkeley, CA. Although the club hosts a lot of bands many people love but I absolutely cannot wrap my head around, the documentary thankfully moves beyond the music to shed light on the behind-the-scenes aspect of collective that operates the venue as well as tracing it's history. First-time filmmaker Jack Curran eschews the traditional narration you get in so many documentaries, but has no trouble conveying a clean, linear narrative through interviews with those involved in Gilman then and now. While a lot of the Berkeley PC-ness, whose aura seemed to envelop Gilman for a long period of time, has subsided to a large degree, the basic elements of hippiedom assumed by the folks who run the place is clearly still in force. I'm not saying this is a good or bad thing, but it's still very much a true collective; one that in many ways is not really that different from a local food co-op, a community bank or an Israeli Kibbutz. The Gilman Street Project started as an experimental, volunteer run punk-oriented venue on New Year's Eve 1986-'87; but by the middle of 1988, the late Tim Yohannon (founder/creator of MaximumRocknRoll and one of the co-founders of Gilman) declared the 'experiment' a failure and walked away. Undaunted, some of the other people who worked there and saw not only it's potential but it's already established position as an anchor for the entire Berkeley scene decided to close it down for a month, re-organize everything, and reopen with a wider variety of music and performances. With the exception of that month, Gilman has continuously run shows every Friday and Saturday night for 20 years now - pretty damn impressive no matter how you look at it. With what's probably the third generation of people coming up through the ranks and running the place now, it's not surprising one person mentions regularly seeing ten and twelve year olds at shows. Overall it's very engaging film that, despite the often crappy music, will probably prove to be an important documentary over time.
—the Kommandant
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