Fair warning, this movie is not just one big combination of inter-genre conflict and wild concert scenes as the trailer would have you assume, and its DEFINITELY nothing like the Swedish House Mafia film "Take One". It most frequently refers back to DJ Premier as a sort of "host", and is really an examination of how best to combine not just musical styles but the work-flows and production techniques that go in to each of these different genres.
Leading up to seeing this movie I had read a lot of different reviews with people claiming this person or that person had gotten the hardest task, but really I think it was evenly distributed. Even Pretty Lights (aka Derek Smith) was able to work country music in to his own unique style once he found the right kind of country music. However, I thought the most interesting scenes in this movie were not those involving music but those involving the personalities behind the music. It was absolutely fascinating seeing how different the cultural aspects of each genre were, and even more fascinating to see music ultimately being able to break down those walls. The quickest combination to embrace one another was between DJ Premier and his various classical collaborators, but I think some of this had to do with the veteran status of both DJ Premier himself as well as the entire genre of Hip-Hop.
In my humble opinion, the coolest moments of the whole movie were Premier's first experience conducting the Berklee Symphony Orchestra and when John Densmore (The Doors' drummer) asked Skrillex for an autograph for his own kid. Just seeing the rockstar persona being passed from one generation to the next was pretty wild, but the eventual respect they found for one another led to an astonishingly great working relationship and some of the coolest in-studio moments of the film. Mark Ronson also provided one of the more engaging characters of the film, although in the end he didn't really produce a fusion of anything as much as he simply made a damn good jazz track. Seeing someone as musically gifted as Ronson just 'at work' was enjoyable in itself though, and there was a genuinely tangible awkwardness in the theater when he met Erykah Badu for the "first" time.
I'm leaving out a bunch of very cool aspects of the movie in the interests of both attention spans and not wanting to spoil the movie, but all in all the Re:Generation Music Project is a blast for anyone that enjoys the creative process behind new musical styles, and especially if you have a bit of tech-nerd in you as the studio and live-show scenes will be extra impressive.The soundtrack is available for FREE (here), and the [rest of] the website has a bit more information of the project and its history.
Click HERE for a gallery from the Re:Generation website!
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