As lightweight, funny and enjoyable as the music genre it details, YACHT ROCK: A DOCKUMENTARY really took me back to all the music I listened to in the late 70's and early 80's.
Toto, Steely Dan, James Ingram, The Doobie Brothers, Kenny Loggins, Michael McDonald, Christopher Cross, they're all here, often with hilarious, self-effacing stories from the era.
Well, Steely Dan isn't here, but even the way he blows off Director Garret Price's approach to appear is perfectly captured and a big laugh.
Detailing the emergence of the genre, which fit somewhere between rock and pop, but never too hard of rock, and not Country rock, the film immerses you in footage from the mid to late 70's in California.
Steely Dan launches the rocket, with a new blend of jazz and pop that's studied, perfect, but plays to the masses. Who didn't own the album "Aja" back in the day!? Still sited as one of the most perfectly recorded albums of all time, the first hit song "Peg" launches the group into superstardom. (Do you know what the other album that many industry folks consider the finest studio recording of an album?*)
I loved seeing all the players in these recording sessions. There's a lot of talent bouncing off those walls.
Watching Steve Porcaro, David Paitch and Steve Luthaker rise from an LA high school band to the most respected studio musicians on the planet is a blast. It's even more enjoyable when you know that that high school band became Toto.
EVERYONE owned Toto IV, still one of the best albums of the era. "Rosanna", "Lovers in the Night", "Africa" come on!!
Watching footage from the day and all their stories of how the throwaway final track on the Album, "Africa" became the bands only number one hit will put a smile on your face.
It's also fun to relive the birth of the MTV era and the rise of Madonna, Duran Duran and Michael Jackson, video savvy stars who thrived on the visuals. Studio bands like Toto and Steely Dan, not so much.
I remember seeing Steely Dan live and telling my friend halfway through the concert, "they have zero stage presence". Walter Becker and Donald Fagen have recorded some of the finest music of the last century, but they have ZERO interest in entertaining you on a stage. When I shut my eyes that night, the band sounded flawless, just like the albums. But I could have HEARD the music at home!
Seeing Toto live a couple times across the decades was always a mixed bag. Never when it came to the music, the instrumentals rocked, all the hits were well delivered, but the lead singers aged, some better than others. It never mattered though, the band was so committed to entertaining you with high energy (the Anti-Steely approach) that it was always a great evening.
Price keeps the documentary, oops I mean DOCKumentary moving quickly with great interviews and reflections from the stars, concert footage from back in the day and music videos. I enjoyed some of the never before seen recording studio footage the most.
The decades long friendships between McDonald and Cross and McDonald & Loggins is inspiring.
With wall-to-wall music of the era, 99% of which I loved in the day and still do, this is like sitting down with friends you've known for forty years and having them share legendary stories, while a greatest hits collection plays comfortably in the background.
This one might be on permanent rotation.
YACHT ROCK gets an A.
*1967's soundtrack recording of Burt Bacharach's score for the OO7 spoof, "Casino Royale" is often referenced as the perfect studio recording.
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