Last night I watched this Peter Himmelman documentary.  It was awful.

Well, it wasn’t THAT bad, but for all the professionalism, for all the perfect sound, the filmmakers forgot one key movie element…STORY!  Without it you’ve got a film, a series of connected segments, but you don’t have a movie.  A movie brings you into an unknown world, where you bathe in the experience, learning not only about the subject, but yourself.

Oh, there was a story in this documentary "Mittin Derinin" (that’s yiddish, Peter’s an observant Jew), but it was buried under endless performance segments.  And this was a tragedy.  Because the key plot point, the one I was waiting to be explored, was whether to give up your dream.  WHEN to give up your dream.  Whether YOU’RE in control of your life, or it just drifts right by you.

Blame the Beatles.  They made everybody want to be a rock star.  If you were around back then, you know everybody bought an electric guitar, learned a bunch of chords and formed a band.  Sure, to pull girls, but primarily to exult in the joy of music-making.

And this trend continued until sometime in the nineties.  When boy bands eclipsed musicians on MTV and there were other, quicker ways to become rich.  And that’s an interesting topic to examine, the shift of music from being primary in our society to secondary, but the question laid out in this film and not fully explored was about those who came before, who bought the dream and had some success but not enough to retire, where are THEY at, how are THEIR lives doing.

Peter Himmelman got deals.  He criss-crossed the country 18 times on tours.  He opened for legendary bands.  He sold out halls.  But he never broke through.  He got married.  He had four kids.  He had to pay the bills.  He got a gig scoring "Judging Amy".  Which he admits he hates.  But the fear of its evaporation is scary.  And that happens.  The gig is over.  What is Peter to do?  He’s been off the road too long, his fans have moved on.  But music is all he knows.  So he goes back on tour.  To very little audience and no acclaim.

Some people are so talented their songs are enough to make a show.  Others have to work the crowd, they’re performers, being there is EVERYTHING, you can’t duplicate the effect on record.  Peter Himmelman is a performer.  He only lights up in these circumstances.  In his own movie, off stage, he’s unlikable.  Not exactly pompous, it’s just that his ego shows through.  And you need an ego to make it, to stick it out.  But what do you do when your ego outstrips your success?  When it’s almost all you’ve got left?  Do you retire and laugh about it, dying on the inside, or soldier on?

Peter lets go of the old band, the dudes he’s been working with for thirty years, and hooks up with a group from Israel, Flying Baby.  They’re good, the sound works, but it’s too much for his now geriatric crowd, they can’t handle the loud noise.  Realizing he can’t abandon his fan base, to the degree it exists, he hooks up with the old players.  Players who’ve given up their whole lives for the rock and roll dream.  Unfulfilled.  That’s a highlight.  The now and then pictures.  And the musicians delineating how they got sucked into being lifelong players.  Believing that major league success was just around the corner.  Whereas the little fame they possess has been evaporating.  And they’ve got no job with an upward career path, no house, none of the lifestyle of those who used to look up to them in high school, their early twenties.  If you look yourself in the mirror and admit you’re a failure is it a crushing blow you can’t sustain, so therefore you play on?

I wish these questions were answered in this documentary.  Or at least explored further.  Never mind the stress on family members, the disappointment of parents.  Didn’t Bruce Springsteen’s mother say it wasn’t too late to go to college?  Well, believe me, it’s too late for Himmelman and his buds to reeducate themselves.

But the future is bleak.  Peter flies to L.A. for a meeting about scoring a new project and gets blown off, by someone his junior, who doesn’t even give him an excuse, just doesn’t show up.  This would keep many in bed, but Peter’s got a gig to do that night.

And in each gig, Peter tries to connect, tries to enrapture the audience.  And it’s tough.  Because the venues aren’t full.  You can sense failure in the air.  Still, Peter tries.  He sends a fan out to find grass from a field so he can make noises blowing through it on stage.

Still, these endless segments were too much to take.  At about the fourth interminable live segment, I started to fast-forward, trying to get to the small interstitial segments of talking, trying to divine the story.  But watching Peter exit a hall at two times speed, I slowed the DVD down and found out the gig wasn’t over.  He was leading those in attendance to a city park.  When finally there, he said the show was over.  That this was just a bonus.  Then he started to strum his guitar.  And everybody started to sing along.  To Peter’s song "Impermanent Things".

I’ve been hyped on Peter more than once.  I never really got it.  Sure, he’s talented, but not quite enough.  I know, that’s a harsh review, but rock and roll is a tough game.  Still, I was familiar with the song he was playing.  I’d heard it before.

The acoustic strumming cut to my core.  The way it did at campfires of yore.  Before I got a chance to throw the dice on my aspirations, when I was just experiencing life, when every moment counted, in a way I wasn’t even aware of.

And then everybody started to sing along.

There were probably forty people in attendance.  And they seemed to know every word.  But worried about the magic evaporating Peter started to give lines to the audience, so they could keep up.

There was no amplification.  Just a group of people.  In the middle of nowhere.  Having the time of their lives.

You can’t duplicate this on tape.  No hard drive in an arena can have the same effect.  This can’t be preprogrammed.  It’s got to be spontaneous.  It’s got to feel like it’s for you only.  It’s got to be a story that only you can tell.  Even if you don’t.

Have you gone to a club and seen your favorite band?  And sung along with every note?  Not even noticing the rest of the people in the room?  That’s what this was like.  But better.  Because everybody in attendance was JUST LIKE YOU!  Not checking their look, not worried about exiting from the parking lot, just exulting in the joy of music.

All these impermanent things
Oh how they fool me
Dominate and rule me

A little success is worse than failure.  Because you can’t give up.  You’ve tasted the applause, the accolades, you’re addicted, you believe you can win at the slot machine of life.

In high school everybody’s interested in you.  The teachers, the administration, your parents.  How are you going to turn out.  But after graduation, you’re on your own.  If you fuck it up, it’s your own damn fault.  And people focus on winners.  Yet you’re still human, with feelings, you’re still here.

I’d like to see a movie that explores all this.  In neither the heavy-handed nor lighthearted fashion of VH1, rather in the style of "You Can Count On Me".  One that realizes it’s life and life only.

Still, I can’t get "Impermanent Things" out of my head.  Or the story Peter told of writing a song for his dying father (maybe this one, it wasn’t clear) and bonding with him in a way that made both of them cry.  For your parents are impermanent.  Your whole life is about separating from them.  But when they’re gone, you just want them back.

"Impermanent Things" has got the feel of your bedroom alone after school.  Or maybe your first solo apartment in your twenties after work.  We do our best in this society not to feel, to keep busy, so we don’t have to face how scary life is.  We used to count on musicians to explore these dark areas for us.  And when successful, we followed them, we believed in them.

And that’s why people still come to see Peter Himmelman.  To bask in his humanity.  Yet to be the provider…  Why are they coming, are they still coming?  The self-doubt can be enormous.  You’re burdened by the little impermanent success you had.  Willing it to be permanent.  But oftentimes that’s beyond your power.  What do you do then?