Urgh! A Music War (1982)
Urgh! A Music War is a British film released in 1982 featuring performances by punk rock, new wave, and post-punk acts, filmed in 1980. Among the artists featured in the movie are Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (OMD), Magazine, The Go-Go's, Toyah Willcox, The Fleshtones, Joan Jett & the Blackhearts, X, XTC, Devo, The Cramps, Oingo Boingo, Dead Kennedys, Gary Numan, Klaus Nomi, Wall of Voodoo, Pere Ubu, Steel Pulse, Surf Punks, 999, UB40, Echo & the Bunnymen and The Police. These were many of the most popular groups on the New Wave scene; in keeping with the spirit of the scene, the film also features several less famous acts, and one completely obscure group, Invisible Sex, in what appears to be their only public performance.
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If you don't like this, we can't be friends.
Good movie but grossly overrated
Absolutely brilliant
The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.
Over 10 years ago, when visiting a vinyl record convention, 14-year old me got talked into buying the soundtrack of this picture. It grew out to be my favourite record, containing many of my favourite artists and introducing a few more, all with excellent performances. Sometimes live records are just so much better than studio albums. Sadly, I do not live in the US, so it seemed near-impossible for me to ever lay my hands on a DVD (or even VHS) recording, but I somehow did. It was a copy of a copy of a copy, with some sound missing, but still glorious. I put it on in the background when having friends over or for some late-night watching. It's almost as if you're there, you can feel the energy of the bands and the audiences alike, and most of these performances are definitely of these bands in their prime. I've seen some of them live since, and it's just not the same. Some others never come to mainland Europe or have since passed away (Lux Interior!), so this remains a gem.
In the 80s, there were some REALLY good movies about the underground music/art scene - Mondo New York, Decline of Western Civilization and Urgh! (just to name a few) but Urgh! takes the cake for me. I put it above the rest because it's all JUST about the music. No blah blah blah...no commercial bull flop - no NOTHING but music and some of the AMAZING musicians that were out performing at the time.I did not like the Police getting 3 tracks however. That smacked of some favoritism but since they were the deep pockets at the time, anything less probably would have resulted in no movie at all. That's why God gave us the Fast Forward and Skip buttons I believe. LOL.Watching this movie gives you a brief albeit somewhat lacking skim of the entire punk/new wave scene at the time, but given the ocean of music that was out there when I was a young pup, it's probably the best possible collaboration given the time and money available for production. It is a MUST VIEW for any music aficionado. Rapidly moving from Wall of Voodoo to Pere Ubu to XTC to OMD and on and on and on is like watching your young life go by (if you were born in the 60s *grin*) on Fast Forward and it is WONDERFUL! That said, it's heartbreaking now to see how young and talented all those folks were and how few remain relevant today...but music today is EXACTLY what Jello Biafra predicted in would be: "If you don't keep your eyes open...you'll be forced to buy skinny tie...pop bands". Well, the skinny ties are mostly gone - but today's bubblegum, idiotic pop music is all powerful and sickening - gone is the creative, roaring flame of the late 70s/early 80s music scene - replaced with vapidness like Britney Spears et al.Urgh! was and still is a testament to what great music and culture are all about. It's an irreproducible miracle of the modern age and we will never see anything like it again short of a new age of enlightenment affecting all mankind. Find it! Watch it! PRESERVE it! COVET IT!! I give it two thumbs up, a snap, a circle twist and 4 zillion stars.
This movie is spectacular! It is a perfect snapshot of the post-punk/new-wave movement in the early 80's. Great performances by some well-known artists when they were still newcomers, and some other interesting bands that never quite made it.I had somehow not heard of this movie until it was long out of print - and it took a great deal of searching to track it down, but was well worth it. Seeing the Police, Devo, Gary Numan, Echo & The Bunnymen, X and all the other artists in their younger days is just amazing.Someone needs to sort out the legal crap and get this remastered and issued on DVD. It's way too hard to find it used or bootlegged - but it's too much a piece of music history to just disappear on worn-out VHS tapes.
It aired on the late, great, NIGHT FLIGHT on USA back in the 80's. It's fun to watch and see who is still kicking around. The highlight is the Go Go's with a very young Belinda Carlisle looking all chubby and tough with her peroxided short punk hair. I recommend it to anyone interested in punk and early 80's music. Well worth searching for.