You're Gonna Miss Me : A Film About Roky Erickson
by Keven McAlester
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DVD details
Actor: 13th Floor Elevators, Byron Coley, Evelyn Erickson, Roky Erickson, Sumner EricksonDirector: Keven McAlester
Brand: UNIVERSAL MUSIC VIDEO DIST.
Producer: Keven McAlester
Producer: Adrienne Gruben
Producer: Amanda Micheli
Producer: D.W. Harper
Producer: Kate Roughan
Producer: Laura Boyd DeSmeth
Producer: Lauren Hollingsworth
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language)
Format: Color, DVD, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 91 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2007-07-10
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: Palm Pictures / Umvd
Product features:
- This is the story of Roky Erickson: manic frontman for the legendary band The 13th Floor Elevators, creators of psychedelic music and muse to Janis Joplin. YOURE GONNA MISS ME is a disturbingly intimate portrait of an imploding family and the struggle between modernized medicine and religion. Known for his colossal heroin & LSD binges, struggles with schizophrenia, and an unthinkable term at Rusk
DVD Reviews of You're Gonna Miss Me : A Film About Roky Erickson
DVD Review: dramatic yet sometimes amusing film about one of America's untold irresistible rock legends
Summary: 5 Stars
This excellent documentary about Roky Erickson gives us great insight into his life so far as well as his success in the music industry. Sadly, we also witness his slow but sure descent into schizophrenia after using LSD over 300 times and other drugs as well. This story has it all: a broken family in which little is actually discussed; an ill son being cared for by a controlling mother who (very conveniently) does not trust psychiatry to help her son Roky; divorce; bands inside a high security psychiatric hospitals with murderers as members of the band--and even more.
The movie flows well and there's little that could be edited out; it's all very interesting and Roky's story is told with great sensitivity and respect. His voice WAS incredible--and it still IS! He can still play guitar, sing well and jam with his band in live concerts after considerable counseling and psychiatric drug treatment for his schizophrenia. The cinematography is excellent and the interviews with Roky's brothers, his two ex-wives, his son, his mother, his father and others really impress me. It's also quite a testament to Roky's talent to have greats like Billy Gibbons from ZZ Top and Thurston Moore from Sonic Youth comment on just how influential Roky and the first band he played with, The 13th Floor Elevators, really were. There's also excellent archival footage from American Bandstand when Roky and the rest of The 13th Floor Elevators played on the show hosted by Dick Clark; and even the still photos of Roky back in the day are wonderful.
As others have noted, the film opens with a court hearing about guardianship for Roky; the judge decides that Roky's brother Sumner would be a better choice for guardianship than Roky's mother who clearly has problems of her own. It's great to see Roky's transformation while he's living with his brother.
It may well seem as if I've given the whole story away; but I assure you I didn't. The stories we get from Roky's two former wives are incredible; and there's yet another brief interview with a former girlfriend of Roky's that I also liked. The archival footage is electric in ways that words cannot express and the time Sumner interviews his own father about Roky is also quite interesting. There's quite a story about what happened to Roky when he was caught with a single marijuana cigarette; be on the lookout for that!
The DVD comes with some nice extras. In particular, I liked the deleted scenes and the brief extra about the filmmakers. I'll let you discover the other bonus features on your own!
This documentary is quite powerful, moving and memorable. Indeed, you'll be rooting for Roky just as I was because he is truly a decent human being with many charming qualities even when he's not feeling well. I highly recommend this film for people who enjoy biographies and people who enjoy rock from the 1960s. In addition, people who like films that show the disabled struggling to achieve their goals despite the odds would do well to add this to their collections.
DVD Review: This was a gift....
Summary: 5 Stars
Great video and great service from Amazon - had already seen movie - this was a gift and was excellent!!!DVD Review: Interesting!
Summary: 4 Stars
I missed this when it aired on Sundance and it sounded interesting enough that I bought it. It is a tragic story. Though it centers around Roky Erickson, it shows the deeper tragedy surrounding his entire family. DVD Review: Survival of an American Music Icon
Summary: 4 Stars
"You're Gonna Miss Me" is a creative, superbly made documentary on the life of Austin rock legend Roky Erickson. Fans should be warned that the film isn't a music video or a retrospective of any kind, and so shouldn't be approached as such. It is not even "entertainment", though it's very engaging, moving and even suspenseful. Those seeking only Roky's music should just skip to the Extras (although there you'll find his full reading of "I Know the Hole in Baby's Head", which strongly hints at the dark real-life stuff in the film). Only some brief interviews with folks like Thurston Moore and ZZ Top's Billy Gibbons give the film any commonality with typical music docs.
Rather the film is a harrowing, painful and unblinking story of personal survival. It portrays, with incredible up-close intimacy, Erickson's lifelong schizophrenia and the chillingly dysfunctional and tragic family from which he has no means to distance himself. You'll find yourself amazed that he's still alive and getting by - in his own odd way - after all he's been through.
Most of the film documents Erickson's day-to-day life with his mother, and we soon realize she's as toxic a presence in his life as mental illness or state incarceration ever were. Think of the Pink Floyd song "Mother" and you'll have some clue about this woman, who is nonetheless a sympathetic figure herself. She plainly cares and means well. Most interestingly, she's very musical and artistic herself - and nearly as eccentric as her son is.
One of Roky's brothers (a classical musician) finally stages an intervention. A Texas court appoints the brother as Roky's sole guardian; at last getting him the proper treatment he so badly needs. While the film doesn't have a "happy" conclusion, at least it ends with Roky being much more stable and contented than he'd been in years. Those closest to Erickson describe him as always being very likable and sweet; and this quality still shines brightly forth from him despite everything. I very much wonder how he's doing today.
DVD Review: Tragic story. Happy ending?
Summary: 5 Stars
File this astounding documentary of a dysfunctional family right next to your DVDs of Crumb, Capturing the Friedmans and your CD of Wild Man Fisher. Keven McAlister's excellent direction of one family's struggle to help a mentally ill member takes us inside the drama in a beautiful and revealing way. Mother vs brother, who can help this man? BTW, I saw Roky perform at Seattle's Bumbershoot in 2007. He arrived in fine form, good press lead to a large and enthusiastic crowd, and put on a good show. Don't miss this one.
Description of You're Gonna Miss Me : A Film About Roky Erickson
The Fascinating Story of Rock `n Roll Pioneer Roger Kynard "Roky" Erickson And His Struggles With Drug Addiction and Mental Illness.Outside Austin, Texas, a 53-year-old man sits in an apartment with four radios, three televisions, two amps, a radio scanner, and a Casio electric piano playing all at the same time. Loudly. He has three teeth, his hair is matted into one huge dreadlock, and he has a notarized document on his wall declaring himself an alien, "so whoever's putting shocks to my head will stop."
Special Features: 90+ Minutes of Rare & Exlusive Bonus Footage including:
* Historic, Uncut Live Performances: "COLD NIGHT FOR ALLIGATROS" & Intimate Acoustic Performances of "BLOODY HAMMER," STARRY EYES," "RIGHT TRACK RIGHT NOW," "DON'T SLANDER ME," and many more
* The Complete "I KNOW THE HOLE IN BABY'S HEAD" and other readings by Roky
* The Collected Works of EVELYN ERICKSON
* POSTSCRIPT: Austin City Limits Festival Documentary (2005)
* POSTSCRIPT: Roky's Emancipation Hearing (2007)
* DELETED SCENES & EXTRA DOCUMENTARY FOOTAGE
In the annals of spooked rock, Roky Erickson is a legend. When you hear his wobbling, impassioned, vocal yowl, you have to admit: He could've been a sort of psychedelic, proto-punk, American Van Morrison. Alas, history has been less kind to Roky. Kevin McAlester's documentary discloses precisely why (and how) Roky's early status as an icon--a maverick rock genius as demonstrated by his band, the 13th Floor Elevators--went sadly awry. At the center of You're Gonna Miss Me are some crucial dramatic tropes: a terribly broken family; a pressing, age-old "Am I my brother's keeper" predicament; and a relatively simple case of schizophrenia. The film opens in a courtroom, Erickson's aging and awkward mother, Evelyn, and his youngest brother, Sumner, locked in a battle for guardianship over the then-53-year-old, mentally imbalanced singer. The film captures Thurston Moore (Sonic Youth), Patti Smith, and Billy Gibbons (ZZ Top), among others, testifying to Roky's non-pareil genius. Also present, however, are tales of Roky's singular madness--extended acid and heroin binges and, alas, his then-present-day condition, living in cramped, decrepit quarters with an array of transistor radios, stereos, TVs, and keyboards, all cranked fully as he placidly reclines or wanders aimlessly.
The film painstakingly shows the Erickson family's longstanding fissures, contextualizing Roky's schizophrenia and, disarmingly, putting his mother's own awkward idiosyncratic behavior on display. Lee Daniel's cinematography brilliantly captures the desolation and desperation of Roky's life, camera shaking and panning and finding hidden angles to show the strange, seemingly endless schizophrenic signs around the singer--dozens of antennae, stacks and stacks of mail strewn throughout his apartment, and Evelyn's complicated obsession with Roky's history--from his highpoints as a rocker to his tragic three-year stay at the Rusk State Hospital for marijuana possession (where, for example, he played in an ad hoc band with a couple of murderers, a rapist, and, improbably, a hospital counselor) to her own, eerie film project where she casts Roky as "the king of the beasts" in a home-movie she undertakes as a "legacy" for the family. The film is all about otherworldly dimensions, centering in large part on youngest brother, Sumner--himself an accomplished musician playing tuba with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra--and his legal battle to become Roky's guardian and get Roky "simple medical care" and medication for his schizophrenia. This is an important chapter in the history of rock, without the underlying humor that made Dig! an indie film hit in 2005 but with a much larger historical purview. --Andrew Bartlett
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