From Ney Matogrosso, St. Vincent and Matthew Herbert to Poly Styrene and Shane MacGowan, IndieMusic’s programme, the IndieLisboa section that merges cinema and music, points a bigger focus to individual stories this year, from international and national punk icons, artists that reinvented themselves and others who are ready to be revealed.
These are stories to be discovered between August 21 and September 6, during the 2021 edition of IndieLisboa, which this year returns once again to Cinema São Jorge, Culturgest, Cinemateca Portuguesa and Cinema Ideal.
Shane MacGowan and Poly Styrene were born on the same year, 1957, and became big names of punk.
Crock of Gold: A Few Rounds with Shane MacGowan traces the biography of The Pogues leader, inspired poet and irresistible performer, crossing film archive, interviews with MacGowan and conversations with different characters (from Gerry Adams, former president of Sinn Féin, to Nick Cave or Bobby Gillespie).
In Poly Styrene: I Am a Cliché , the opening of Poly’s artistic archives, punk icon and X-Ray Spex vocalist, comet that shook the British musical scene at the end of the 70s and that served as inspiration for the movements riot grrrl and afropunk.
Ney Matogrosso, St. Vincent and Matthew Herbert are three chameleons, from reinvention to reinvention.
Ney à Flor da Pele is a visual anthology, composed by archive footage, of performances and words by the Brazilian artist, from the time of Secos e Molhados until today.
The Nowhere Inn is an inspired and fun mockumentary, that takes advantage of the real friendship between Carrie Brownstein (from Sleater-Kinney and the series Portlandia) and Annie Clark (aka St. Vincent), in a confront of creative forces to film a documentary about the life of St. Vincent.
Matthew Herbert is one of the most versatile and visionary conceptual artists of our time. The Symphony of Noise follows the creative process of the musician, showing how Herbert thinks and makes music with sounds and noises of daily life.
In the field of discoveries, there is space to get to know Ilhan Mimaroglu, John Cohen and Patrick Cowley.
Mimaroğlu: The Robinson of Manhattan Island is a portrait of Ilhan Mimaroğlu, the little known composer of electronic music and Turkish Avant-Garde, and his wife, Güngör, who was connected to the North-American civil rights movement, after they migrated there in 1959.
Different Johns is a portrait of John, folk musician and founder of New Lost City Ramblers, but also photographer, filmmaker and anthropologist with a singular role in the register and collaboration with Jack Kerouac, Woodie Guthrie, Allen Ginsberg, Robert Frank and a young Bob Dylan.
The music producer Patrick Cowley, creator of the remix turned hit I Feel Love de Donna Summer, has in Patrick a poetic and fair homage.
Other two films have numerous people inside.
Sisters With Transistors is the story to be told of the pioneers of electronic music Clara Rockmore, Daphne Oram, Bebe Barron, Delia Derbyshire, Maryanne, Amacher, Pauline Oliveros, Wendy Carlos, Eliane Radigue, Suzanne Ciani, and Laurie Spiegel, names often hidden and forgotten.
Nueve Sevillas is a portrait of new generations and costumes of flamenco, amongst which the dancer Javiera de la Fuente, the poet David Pielfort or the Romani lawyer and feminist Pastora Filigrana and performances of Niño de Elche, Silvia Pérez Cruz and Rosalía
And finally a band, and what a band!Chunky Shrapnel is an immersive film-concert of the Australian psychedelic band King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, that follows the band on their tour in 2019, through Europe, with the album Infest the Rats’ Nest on their backs. A film-concert in a year where concerts stopped.
Portuguese music continues to be well represented.
Paulo Antunes, who in 2019 filled the Manoel de Oliveira room, in São Jorge, with his previous film Um Punk Chamado Ribas, continues on his journey through the Alvalade neighbourhood and national punk, now with Já Estou Farto!, which puts the focus on João Pedro Almendra, the stage animal that formed Ku de Judas and was the voice of Peste & Sida, PunkSinatra and the rock projectOs Filhos de Hannibal Lecter, while also being at the genesis of Censurados.
Eram 27 Dias e Paraste, is a backstage documentary about the latest Noiserv album, “Uma palavra começada por N”, at the Lisbon Teatro Tivoli BBVA. Caudal is a film about a concert of Solar Corona never to be repeated and We Were Floating High follows First Breath After Coma during the incredible year of 2019, when they released the album NU, before everything changed.
They jury of the competitive section IndieMusic will award a prize of 1000€ to the best film of the section and is composed of Cláudia Guerreiro (Linda Martini), Yaw Tembe (musician e programmer of Teatro do Bairro Alto) and Yen Sung (DJ). The winner will be announced at the end of the 18th edition of IndieLisboa.
The programme for the other sections of the festival will be announced soon.
List of selected films:
Feature Films:
A Symphony of Noise (Enrique Sánchez Lansch / Germany)
Chunky Shrapnel (John Angus Stewart / Australia)
Crock of Gold: A Few Rounds with Shane MacGowan (Julien Temple / United Kingdom, USA)
Different Johns (Robert Carr / France, Germany, Peru, USA)
Já Estou Farto! (Paulo Antunes / Portugal)
Mimaroğlu: The Robinson of Manhattan Island (Serdar Kökçeoğlu / Turkey, USA)
Ney à Flor da Pele (Felipe Nepomuceno / Brazil)
Nueve Sevillas (Gonzalo García Pelayo, Pedro G. Romero / Spain, France)
Poly Styrene: I Am a Cliché (Celeste Bell, Paul Sng / United Kingdom)
Sisters With Transistors (Lisa Rovner / United Kingdom)
The Nowhere Inn (Bill Benz / USA)
Shorts
Caudal (Luís Sobreiro / Portugal)
Eram 27 Dias e Paraste (Jota Assis e Noiserv/ Portugal)
Patrick (Luke Fowler / United Kingdom)
We Were Floating High (Tiago Gomes / Portugal)