The Holy Modal Rounders: Bound to Lose (2006)

Documentary covering the extensive, drugged out career of psych-folk freaks The Holy Modal Rounders (a full band, but centered around the duo of Steve Weber and Peter Stampfel). Over the span of about 45 years they fight, fall out, take drugs, ignore each other, one cleans up (in a kinda burned out hippy way) the other stays “freaky” and eventually shoot for a reunion. How legit is their hippy cred? They were on the Easy Rider Soundtrack and signed to ESP-Disk (home to Sun Ra, the Fugs and other travelers of the interplanetary expressways).

This is why I’ll never watch “A Mighty Wind”: these men are beyond anything Christopher Guest could ever pull off. If one of these guys walked in you would think it was way too over the top (both in song and behavior). Their particular brand of freak-folk spiked with passive-aggressive confrontational whimsy isn’t quite my cup of tea, but whatever.

Really these two guys have the classic love/hate artistic collaboration. Volatile and neither seems to recognize the power of being the others foil. Watching them bicker isn’t much fun.

I found myself wanting to know more about the people on the sidelines, dudes from the Fugs, long suffering band members, and strange acquaintances that show up at gigs. This longing may have come from realizing that I was being made uncomfortable with the duos dynamic. Neither is squeaky clean, but Weber just seems like a guy you would Hate to be in a band with. Wasted, bored, bitter, showboater, egomaniac who thinks he’s hilarious. Like your Fathers buddy you wish would go home.

That said, I would recommend this for Holy Modal Rounders, Christopher Guest and “Some Kind of Monster” fans. That’s most people, I guess.