Desolation Center

During the early 1980s, I was living in China, playing viola music of Bach, Beethoven and Brahms. PUNK is not in my vocabulary, then and now. Desolation Center was a shock as well as a treat to my ears and eyes.

The storytelling of the film is very engaging. I enjoyed watching the processing, the planning, the footage, the music, the audience, the unexpected visual and sounds.

The film is narrated by Stuart Swezey, the director. It adds a personal touch to the film, and it worked. Through many interviews from musicians, audience, producers, friends, the documentary flows nicely. During the watching of the film, I wished I was free and wild in my youth.

Although Beethoven lost his hearing, he still composed many compositions, including 6 late string quartets and the famous 9th symphony. I think Beethoven would love to be on that raw stage conducting his Punk Symphony, No. 10.

All I can say is that I wish I had been there, and am grateful that Stuart made this documentary so that people like me who are interested can learn more about these bands, and Mark Pauline/SRL. Stuart did an excellent job with this film - both informative and entertaining - never a dull moment! An interesting piece of history now set down in film for those of us who missed out. Thanks, Stuart!

Love this doc!! The music is phenomenal. I highly recommend this film!!

Shuttle busing a murder of LA kids out to the Mojave Desert and attempting a musical happening, Desolation Centre was the first punk version of Woodstock. The bare bones year one operation featured Savage Republic and the Minutemen, proveing successful enough to entice New York scenesters Sonic Youth, german industrial experimenters Einsturzende Neubauten, and mad scientist Mark Pauline blowing up, to join in on the action.

This was the early eighties, and though the rest of the world was chiefly unawares, the Desolation Center projects proved very influential, and pointed directly to such gargantuan beasts as Lollapalooza, Coachella and Burning Man. Luckily photos were taken, footage was shot, and many people survived to retell the tale. The resulting documentary, if a bit scrambled and rough, does a nice job of capturing the yahoo artistic explosion of a new generation looking to create their own identity, their own scene, their own happening.

Stuart Sweezey, who organized the festivals, also directs this doc, and thus offers crucial insider information, but very little distance from the source. It all sounds pretty cool and fabulous and often outta control, and maybe it was, but the film really works best when some of the outsiders like Thurston Moore (who came cross country because he was such a geeky fan) and Blixa Bargeld (who remembers almost nothing) have their say.

Desolation Center works as an historic document, a surprising bit of entertainment, and a look into a time and place few people knew or cared about, but should have.

"To me, punk rock is the freedom to create, freedom to be successful, freedom to not be successful, freedom to be who you are. It's freedom." Patti Smith

For anyone who knows my interest in classical music and tuneful pop, that I know virtually nothing about punk rock is no surprise. Moreover, I was a productive adult in those 80's but oblivious to the power and eccentricity of a music that made, and still does, an impact on our culture, like rap.

In Desolation Center, director Stuart Swezey surveys the punk scene with truncated performances in desert, city, and waterside, allowing for a variety and oddity of spectacle, from blasting guns to blazing fires, and all about the romance of rebellion. To say I knew not one song is to belabor the point that performance shows were as much the point as original, sometimes inscrutable, music.

It seems just short of odd to me that I know the names of the punk groups and not their songs: Minuteman, Savage Republic, Einstruzende Neubauten, Sonic Youth, Meat Puppets, et al. It's the opera of the scene more than the music, from my limited experience.

The original footage of the events and the bands alone make this documentary worth seeing. The excessive talking heads, oh well, keep us from more music.

This has been a most entertaining year with docs like Linda Ronstadt: the sound of my voice and docudramas like Rocket Man. Desolation Center introduces rubes like me to more music, creativity, and cacophony than I ever could have known on my own. For the music obsessed, see this to round out your obsession; for those like me interested in the history of music, this is required listening no matter how challenging the sound might be.