Catching Vibes

Belfast Punk History and the Terri Hooley Film Good Vibrations

A few years ago, engrossed in a re-discovery of the power inherent in the music of my youth, I wrote a piece for MRZine expounding the merits of Julien Temple’s movie about Joe Strummer, viewable at  http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2007/mcdonnell280907.html  

The Future is Unwritten expressed how much of a channel for liberation music can be, especially the raw, gut-filled rhythms of punk rock, and how motivational and uplifting a medium it is for many. While on the one hand, this music was and is just about the joy of being, on the other hand there is always a politicised dimension. And I mean politicised in an archetypal, humanitarian sense of the word, not the dogmatic, ideological constructions we tend to think of as politics.

Punk music is about a lot of things: freedom to express the experience of life in all its peaks and pitfalls, without constraints of family and culture. It is about identification with other disaffected people. All energy and electricity, it awakens, enlivens, carries away. Most of all, it takes music right back to its bare bones and wallops you about the ears and heart with it.

It is that sense of penetration to the quick that made another more recent cinematic experience so poignant for me. Last night, on the 31^st May 2012, in Belfast’s Ulster Hall, the 12^th Belfast Film Festival was launched with the world premiere of Good Vibrations, a film based on the ‘life stories’ of Belfast’s ‘Godfather of Punk’ Terri Hooley. Hooley defied the sectarianism of 1970s Belfast by establishing a cult record shop that cut across divides of religion and even generation. Meantime he recorded local bands such as Rudi and The Outcasts and launched Derry’s The Undertones onto the next stage of their climb towards world renown via London DJ John Peel.

Good Vibrations picks you up and won’t let you down – I’m still there. And can’t wait to watch it again….and again……..

Here’s a link to the facebook page – it’s worth catching up with,

http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Good-Vibrations-The-Film/185645362307

 Have fun and keep it friendly. 🙂