Review of Sound City (2013) by Matt B — 15 Mar 2013

A must-watch for any rock fan, and more importantly Sound City is watchable even for those who don't care for documentaries.

Who does Dave Grohl think he is making a great roc doc having no experience as a director? Regardless, this man can do it all and apparently with ease. Grohl's attention to detail and story is vivid. I myself am not much into documentaries but I knew being a rock fan I had to see this one and I was honestly surprised at how good it was.

Only Dave Grohl could get the likes of Tom Petty, Trent Reznor, Stevie Nicks and of course Neil Young to tell the story of the great Sound City. I did not know too much about Sound City coming into this movie and I was pleased to learn more. Grohl told a great quickly-paced story of the classic recording venue spanning from the 70's all the way until the digital generation of now killed it.

Grohl lets the viewer deep inside the recording studio with Sound City, which is to rock as the recent doc "Side by Side" was to the film industry. Both films focus on how digital is changing our lives and in some ways for the worse as quantity is taking over for quality.

One cool aspect to Sound City was how we're treated to a present day recording session of Sound City's board in Grohl's house as he wanted to save a piece of Sound City as they went out of business. It was a nice change of pace and it was cool to see some of these old artists record on the historical board one last time. It did suck however that Grohl couldn't get Tom Petty or Neil Young to record with him.

If Grohl is this good in his directorial debut, I hope he continues telling rock stories because he has a true talent for rock story-telling.