Good music takes you back in time. Real good music takes you back emotionally to the very instant you first heard it. In Not Fade Away, The Sopranos creator David Chase’s first project in five years, music’s power to shape and change a culture is powerfully rendered. An excellent cast of nobodies and James Gandolfini, and a great score selected by E-Street band member Steve van Zandt combine to bring back the feelings the music itself originally produced. While I was myself on the cusp of teenagerhood in the years depicted here (1963-1968), I can relate to Chase’s story of kids starting a band and going through changes. Even more importantly, I can testify to the film’s uniqueness in conjuring up the exact vibe from back in the day when music was everything.
So do you need to be pushing Social Security age to appreciate Not Fade Away? Hardly. If you think lead character Douglas Damiano (an excellent John Magaro) and his bandmates are anything but cool in choosing The Rascal’s “I Ain’t Gonna Eat Out My Heart Anymore” as their demo song, you probably wouldn’t know a good tune if it hit you in the kisser. When Douglas gets his moment to come from behind the drum kit and take over as the band’s lead singer to the tune of The Stones’ “Time Is In My side'” it stands out as one of many goosebump moments. And by the time Douglas’s sister (who has served as narrator and at first seems a marginal character) closes the film doing a little dance to the Sex Pistol’s version of Jonathan Richman’s “Roadrunner,” the realization sets in that the film’s five-years span equals an eternity in culture-years. From the innocence of Douglas and bandmates Eugene (Jack Huston, Boardwalk Empire) and Wells (Will Brill) when the fledgling band covers the Stones, Kinks and Bo Diddley, to a fevered climax where Charles Manson himself may be offering Doug a lift–things are changing fast.
Likewise, change is clear in Douglas’s relationship with his sneering, disapproving dad, Pasquale (Gandolfini). The temperamental Pasquale increasingly goes off while watching his son put more and more of his energy in the band, begin to dress in Cuban heels, and grow his hair. A crescendo is reached when Douglas disses the Vietnam war and Pop really snaps. After a bit, an olive branch will emerge from Pasquale, one of many stellar tone changes that Chase conducts like a maestro.
If Chase, who drummed and played bass in a band during the same years depicted here, is tapping into a wellspring of autobiographical background, he does so with nary a cliche to be found anywhere. Not Fade Away is the polar opposite of a sentimental let’s-start-a-band ode. Its attention to detail (including great TV clips of the era) and its exuberant, sharp dialogue make for a bittersweet story. Not to be outdone, Van Zandt has chosen his soundtrack perfectly. The final scene may evoke the headscratching finale of The Soprano to some. To my way of thinking it is a perfect exclamation point to a plucky tale that harks back to an era when the only joy to be counted on was the music, and the only certainty was change.
