I just came across the above video featuring a scene from Heavy Metal Parking Lot (1986), which is a cult classic documentary about Heavy Metal in the 80s that I had never heard of. How in God’s name did I miss this? I may have to rent this on Netflix along with Decline of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years (1988)—which I also haven’t seen—for a special double-feature at the bavahouse, or maybe part of the bavacon movie marathon?
Thanks for this goodness go to my new favorite blogger, Renè Garcia, Jr. on I Love this World.
I was a total heavy-metal junkie as a kid- Iron Maiden, Metallica, Yngwie Malmsteen, Black Sabbath. Loved it.
And people were absolutely this ridiculous in those parking lots. Let’s just say that, in terms of fan IQ, I’m glad I discovered new-wave and post-punk.
-G
My friend made me watch a documentary of metal music in high school it was pretty interesting. It was called Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey
I remember seeing it at Vancouver’s long-deceased Blinding Light Cinema, on a double bill with a film called Dream Deceivers, which ends up being a good complement, also concerning fans of Judas Priest, and an interesting examination of the interplay between Heavy Metal and Christianity: http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=-5636910946432086857
Hope you get to see the full HMPL soon, in the meantime here is the full set of trading cards:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8832088@N05/sets/72157609835935213/
My first concert was AC/DC on 14 December 1989 when I was 14 years old, so I just managed to scrape in one show before the 80s were over.
I still can’t believe we dressed like that…
That ridiculousness is what I love about the folks in that video. I mean the girl saying “Hell Yeahhh” and the guy singing Judas Priest lyrics marks many an evening in a local parking lot drinking beers (although with no concert to go to) and just being stupid. There is a great liberation in being stupid, and I try not to forget that despite the field I blog in
@Shanon:
Looks like Yuletide backs you up on that one, I have to check it out, perhaps we could make it a triple feature
@Brain:
Also, I just watched the whole movie, and looking at James vance may be one of the single most difficult feats in film. It is truly disturbing, and the film is bizarre in that Judas Priest in Reno being accused of killing one kid and disfiguring another seems beyond reason. Yet the reason of the film quickly bring you into the living room of James parents on the couch, fat, done, and completely in denial about a life of quiet desparation. It’s painful to watch that film.
Those trading cards are amazing, why haven’t you blogged them?
@Mike:
AC/DC in 1989, and enviable concert. My brother got in to the first big trouble of our long career in that capacity at an AC/DC concert in 1985. We still talk about that episode.
@Laura:
Rush, now there’s a band I can get behind. Neil Pert rocked! And what was it with Canadian Mist, we had that going around our circles early on too. Funny how we started with hard alcohol really early, then moved to beer for many a year, then ultimately back to hard alcohol. Is this like a natural progression?
@Mikhail:
Let me know when you do, we will synch-watch it and share via twitter.
@Yuletide:
Shannon up above seems to have liked it, and I may have to add this to the list. I just watched Dream Deceivers recommended by Brian, and that is a wild film. And talk about the questions of text, song, interpretation, and intentionality. What a bizarre trial, it seemed like the only thing on trial was the personal lives of these fucked up families, truly tragic.
Now we are all chronicling ourselves on youtube as a kind of casual embarrassing anthropology.
In other words, we are all in our own heavy metal parking lot now.