David Byrne had one big question, though: “What if it had cooler music?”

July 10, 2022 7:58 PM

Contemporary Color [1h37m] is a 2016 documentary music performance of only the kind David Byrne could envision: championship-level color guard / flag corps performances matched with live musical acts like St Vincent, Nelly Furtado, Ad-Rock and others. Here's the trailer [2m8s] if you just want a taste. Here's Rolling Stone loving the project, and Matt Zoller Seitz for RogerEbert.com not so much.

I have no idea how I stumbled upon this, but I'm so glad I decided to watch!

posted by hippybear (14 comments total)

Link for trailer goes to the whole documentary. My first thought was, "If this trailer is an hour and a half, how long is the actual thing? Eh, it's David Byrne. Could be anything, really."
posted by tllaya at 9:06 PM on July 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

Not available in my country :(
posted by dry white toast at 9:12 PM on July 10, 2022 [2 favorites]

Well I love it! I'm finding it very touching how, in addition to the spectacle of the performance, the documentary creates a lot of room for the perspective of the performers, and how much it means to them to express themselves this way.

I was in marching band in high school, so maybe it's just striking a particular nostalgic nerve, but I dig it.
posted by spenser at 10:36 PM on July 10, 2022

Contemporary Color - Official Trailer - Oscilloscope Laboratories - HD - YouTube
posted by zengargoyle at 10:37 PM on July 10, 2022

According to David Byrne, the process of producing Contemporary Color was what led him to the format for American Utopia.

My wife and I watched Contemporary Color on Kanopy shortly after we saw American Utopia on Broadway, and my reaction to the film was probably closer Matt Zoller Seitz's: two interesting artforms that just happened to be performed together but never quite cohering, but I did appreciate it as a historical precursor for American Utopia, which is one of my favorite concert experiences ever.
posted by bl1nk at 3:18 AM on July 11, 2022 [1 favorite]

I saw this a few years ago and while it was interesting and worth watching, I think I was frustrated by how much time was giving to backstage and whomever was floating around there versus time showing complete performances.
posted by Ayn Marx at 7:27 AM on July 11, 2022 [1 favorite]

"What if we took these sincere young people who practice a unique American art form, and had them perform to music that nobody likes?"
posted by Modest House at 8:07 AM on July 11, 2022 [1 favorite]

This seems neat, and I'm going to watch the whole thing later--large-scale choreography, live performance, niche artistic/athletic competition, two very different kinds of artists collaborating, it pushes a lot of my buttons.

(If you, like me, read the list of performers (who, I will admit, seem less like a carefully curated selection and more like people David Byrne happened to have in his fastidiously-restored vintage Rolodex) and was like 'well, I'm skipping straight to the Zola Jesus part,' it starts at about 57:39.)
posted by box at 8:49 AM on July 11, 2022

"What if we took these sincere young people who practice a unique American art form, and had them perform to music that nobody likes I don't like?"
FTFY
posted by the sobsister at 8:50 AM on July 11, 2022 [6 favorites]

That is a long way from the Santa Clara rifles doing the Bottle Dance.

If you are interested in the history of color guard, that whole video at the link is a view on where it started.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 9:42 AM on July 11, 2022

And don't forget BLAST, the Broadway show that grew out of DCI-champions Star of Indiana evolving into a stage show. (Link to bootleg of the pre-Broadway run on London's West End.) I just cannot wrap my head around David Byrne not having seen and drawn inspiration from it. They won a Tony, for goodness sake!
posted by minervous at 11:37 AM on July 11, 2022

Like Bl1nk, I didn't think it quite worked- for one thing, the guns are always going to be awkward. However, if it makes color guard cooler in the future, it has done its job.
posted by acrasis at 2:56 PM on July 11, 2022

I was in marching band in high school, so maybe it's just striking a particular nostalgic nerve, but I dig it.

I'm really sworn to secrecy, but once when I was cooler, we (a marching band) played with David Byrne and St. Vincent at one of the biggest gigs of my life. It was one of those top ten experiences off of my bucket list I didn't even know I had. When he started performing with his own marching band I was all Leonardo pointing at the TV at it.

We performed Road to Nowhere, naturally *died*
posted by alex_skazat at 9:56 PM on July 11, 2022 [5 favorites]

I was a band nerd in high school, and playing with certain groups would always give me chills.

This movie moved be SO much that I was just so teary in the movie theater, on the train on the way back, and then telling my partner all about it afterwards. It captured (for me) the emotions of that age and how music and performance can drive them.

Needed more swing flags, though.
posted by armacy at 7:55 AM on July 13, 2022