Music On TV - Documentaries/Live Performances

There was a pretty excellent 3 hour tribute to the Old Grey Whistle Test on Friday night, with several live acts from Richard Thompson to Gary Numan to Albert Lee to Kiki Dee, much archive footage and a general warm sense of history.

Unlike the 2007 doc on OGWT repeated the same night in which pompous dicks like Charles Shaar Murray, Paul Morley and especially Mark bloody Radcliffe moaned on about how the show was great, except when they hated it, how Bob Harris was Judas for saying New York Dolls were crap and not being seduced by punk-mania, how Annie Nightingale was cool, how The Tube was cool, etc etc etc

Concert for George (Harrison), which Sky Arts showed a few weeks back. If you like star-studded tribute shows, then Clapton, Macca, Petty, Brooker, Ringo, Jeff Lynne, Albert Lee etc etc etc Cracking stuff.

By genuine coincidence, I got a copy of I Me Mine in a shop today too. Last time I found a 2nd hand copy it was £15 and to hell with that.

BLACK SABBATH fans or general heavy rock fans may wish to know Sky Arts are showing a doc on their final gig concert tomorrow at 9, with said gig concert on Sunday night also at 9.

That Sabs thing was an oddity. The doc was mostly made up of stuff from the gig. When they were talking about the absent Bill Ward, it was like in Green Mile when they stuff a guard into a padded cell to keep him out of the way.

The concert was good, though. Nice deadpan stuff from Ozzy at times: "I nearly said we should do this again... we're not."

There was a Pearl Jam prog on Sky Arts last night which I assume will be repeated during the week. There are shows on Foo Fighters and L7 tonight on Sky Arts from 9pm.

Sky Arts have a long prog on Peter Green, Fleetwood Mac's answer to Syd Barrett, tonight at 9, with an FM concert in Boston on beforehand. Tomorrow night it's Radiohead at 9.

BBC4 are showing a doc on Jeff Beck next Friday (27th). In the meantime, here's Ian Dury:

BBC4 showing the Buena Vista Social Club film tomorrow night, whilst Sky Arts have stuff on Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds on Saturday and Sunday nights.

Scuzz interviewed Black Stone Cherry this week, too, which you might still be able to catch a repeat of.

Scuzz showed a few gigs from last year's Bloodstock this week, and I hope the others turn out to be better than Municipal Waste were.

The L7 doc was good, though, a rather sad rise & fall story.

Sky Arts have a doc on Alice Cooper tomorrow night, then Coldplay live and yet more Johnny Cash on Sunday night.

I see from Wikipedia than Municipal Waste are "crossover thrash", which doesn't help much.

But King 810 were more fun. I don't generally like the throatier singers, but these weren't too bad.

The Alice Cooper doc was very good, though. At least it made it clear that booze (which he often admits to) was only part of his problem, and that coke (which he seldom seems to mention) was possibly much worse for him.

Tonight 23:30 on Vintage TV

The World's Gone Wah-Wah

Going gaga for the wah-wah guitar pedal and its power to transform tracks by the likes of Black Sabbath, Jimi Hendrix and Metallica.