Like most guitar geeks I was officially stoked when the movie “It Might Get Loud” was announced. It was, after all, a documentary starring Jimmy Page, the Edge, and Jack White. The movie promised to bring together all three men, put them in a room, and let them pontificate on various topics pertaining to the electric guitar. I never saw the movie in theaters (mainly because it didn’t play on any screens in my hometown) but I recently saw it on DVD and came away with surprisingly mixed feelings.
But first the positives. The movie is beautifully shot and expertly edited. There were pictures and home movies that I had never seen before and plenty of close-ups of various electric guitars, especially Page’s “number 2″ sunburst 1959 Les Paul (more info on that iconic guitar here). Anyone prone to a bit of GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome) will need to have the visual Rolaids handy throughout. Also, the decision to travel to the hometowns of Page, Edge, and White was a good one. Seeing each man move about in his hometown helped to understand some of the motivation behind the artist.
Those positives aside, I came away from the movie disappointed for several reasons:
1. The documentary’s “narrative thread” was so thin that the average person might miss the fact that it had one at all. Both the Edge and White are highly idiosyncratic players who have created styles that operate largely outside of the electric guitar playing mainstream. Although Page’s guitar style operated in the shadow of the “English blues boom” of the late 1960s/early ’70s, he dabbled in altered tunings, studio effects, acoustic instruments, and (most famously) pulled out the cello bow for use during live versions of “Dazed and Confused” and “How Many More Times.” This is all well-known stuff to guitar geeks. I’m not sure that the average moviegoer would know much about this. And the movie makers make little effort to explain this.
2. There was no effort made to establish what set each guitarist apart from their peers. Page came to fame during an incredibly fertile time in the history of the electric guitar. His peers included George Harrison, Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, and Pete Townshend. The Edge came to prominenece during the heyday of “hair metal.” White is a experimentalist with few other guitarists following his lead. Some context about what made these men different from their peers would have been interesting for the general viewer.
3. The most deadly sin of this movie is (for lack of a better term) its complete “joylessness.” When I began playing the guitar I was motivated by players like Eddie Van Halen and Steve Vai, both players that looked to me like they were having tremendous fun as they played. In tapping Page, Edge, and White, the filmmakers featured three VERY serious-minded players who aren’t exactly the most jovial of people. White comes across as the most dour of the three, even talking at one point about his love of guitars that are difficult to play because he relishes the struggle to make music on such problematic instruments. I came away thinking, “My goodness…he’s a sourpuss, his guitar is horribly out of tune, and his guitar tone stinks.”
Viewed from the perspective of a guitar geek, “It Might Get Loud” rates a solid 3 1/2 stars. The eye-candy appeal of seeing Page’s “number 2″ guitar up close is outstanding. The segments where the Edge talked about his complicated guitar rig were interesting. And White’s commentary on the merits of plasitc guitars was intriguing in a “What in the world?” sort of way. But for those on the periphery or otherwise outside of the guitar geek subculture, “It Might Get Loud” could have gone another, more appropriate title: “It Might Get Boring.”
