Sound City (15)

Drummers, eh? Can't live with 'em (it's noisy), and you can't live without them ('cos then the bassist would have to keep time, and where would that leave you?).

Dave Grohl, it seems, is the exception to half this rule - you can live with him, because he's just a bloody likeable guy.

People still couldn't live without him, though, because take Mr G out of the universe and you have no Nirvana, no Foo Fighters, no Songs For The Deaf from Queens Of The Stone Age, no Them Crooked Vultures.... And, importantly, no Sound City.

For those who spend more time in a cinema than near a stereo, and for those slow on the uptake, Dave Grohl is a multi-instrumentalist whose band Foo Fighters have pretty much conquered the world.

He's also funny, charismatic, got a lovely family - in fact, hating him wouldn't take much effort at all.
Especially as he now seems to have successfully turned his hand to film making. The bastard.

It helps, of course, that he's talking about things he loves - namely music, musicians and the studio where it all began for him.

This could have been a seriously dull affair. It could have been self-indulgent (and it doesn't entirely dodge that bullet), it could have just been a bunch of musicians (and Ratt) sitting around talking about the good ol' days. But it's not.

It's more than that.

As Mr G points out towards the end, it started out as a bid to tell the story of the Neve board - the hulking great recording desk the studio had installed at twice the cost of owner Tom Skeeter's house.
Created by Rupert Neve (the interview with him is lovely), it was at the cutting edge of recording technology. And it was meant to be at the heart of the film.

But the film becomes more than that. Sure, people love the Neve board (Tom Petty looks so at home leaning on it...) but it's the people who become the real story of Sound City. And not just the rock stars who passed through the doors.

The feeling and family, friendship and love runs right through this film - to the extent that when they talk about the day it closed, you find yourself welling up alongside the people on the screen. The studio was so much a part of their lives, they are still coming to terms with its passing.

And you share that with them - and that is entirely down to Grohl.

By staying mostly out of the way, he allows the story to unfold naturally, overlapping stories neatly and with a deft touch not normally associated with one who hits stuff for a living. We find out how the studio played its part in the lives of Neil Young (whose arrival at the studio is a top tale), Tom Petty, Fleetwood Mac, Rick Springfield, producer Keith Olsen, Rage Against The Machine, Nine Inch Nails - basically if you listen to any music of note from the last 40 years, at least one album in your collection will have been recorded here.

And, at a time when the film industry is talking about a digital revolution (Side By Side, the Keanu Reeves documentary, covers this. Expect a review later this month), how perfect that the digitisation of music should play such a part in Sound City, with cheaper alternatives to the studio eventually robbing City of its livelihood.

At a cost, not just to the people who worked there, but to the wider musical world - as current go-to producer Rick Rubin laments.

Now, I'll confess I'm something of an 'old school' tape geek. I grew up surrounded by reel-to-reel players (still have one), I trained as a radio journalist on proper, cut-it-with-a-razor, tape. And loved it. That feeling of touching the thing you're working on is something that can't be replicated. I imagine serial killers feel much the same way, but I digress.

And it's that love of the old school that runs right through this documentary.

I laughed, I got a tad misty-eyed, I ticked off all the albums I had that were recorded there...

That's not to say it's perfect. Not by any means. While the story of the studio and the Neve board and the people whose job basically became their life is vibrantly told, the final act of the film - where Grohl calls in all his famous friends to make a record on the Neve board (now relocated to his home studio) - does get a bit self-indulgent.

Do we need to watch the whole recording session with Paul 'Macca' McCartney? No. Do we need to actually watch Trent Reznor 'using technology as an instrument'? Not particularly. But to be honest, who cares?

By then, Grohl has built up such a bank of goodwill, you forgive him. He's having his fun.

But he's allowed you to have a lot of fun first.

(After a one-night cinema run - you've already missed it - Sound City and its stunning soundtrack will be out on March 11.)