DN: INTERVIEW MURDER IN THE FRONT ROW: ADAM DUBIN
Adam Dubin knows from rock. He directed the videos for the Beastie Boys’ “(You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (To Party)” and “No Sleep ‘Til Brooklyn,” as well as a four-hour documentary about Metallica, “A Year and a Half in the Life of Metallica,” and the band’s video for “Nothing Else Matters.” The New York-based director has now stage-dived into the thrash metal scene of 1980s San Francisco with MURDER IN THE FRONT ROW. He calls the film, which vibrates with interviews, archival concert footage and punishing riffs, “sociology.” We talked to Dubin by phone. These are excerpts of our conversation:
DN: What’s the genesis of this project?
Adam Dubin: I got to know Brian Lew, one of the authors of the book “Murder in the Front Row: Shots From the Bay Area Thrash Metal Epicenter” in 2012 at a Metallica show and he gave me a copy, and the book just stayed with me. It was so riveting, the photographs were so alive that I thought about doing a documentary, and that simmered for several years. Finally I got the money together and in 2016 I approached Brian and Harold Oimoen, the book’s co-author, and from there we agreed on the approach and I went for it. Three years later, we have a movie.
DN: You seem to be drawn to the metal underworld, what with this and your work with Metallica. Do you have an affinity for it?
Dubin: I guess I do. I like it a lot. I just think that the music is so visceral and real—let’s just say a little thrash goes a long way. Obviously I’ve been very fortunate to be involved with Metallica, but, really, the pictures in this book got to me, they were so vital, that I felt like I really understood these young people who were in this scene, and that’s what drew me. I felt I could capture the energy that was in the photographs in a film. I knew there were a lot of stories to be told.
DN: What’s the “energy” you tried to capture? It’s more than just adolescent angst. I mean, the teenagers in the doc seem furious, even crazed.
Dubin: The energy at a thrash metal show is certainly a lot of youthful angst. (Metallica guitarist) Kirk Hammett describes it as being bored and frustrated, your life isn’t really where you want it to be, and you just channel all that inner rage into a healthier place, into this music. The number one thing you hear hanging around these groups—Slayer has said it, Metallica has said it—is that fans always say, “Wow, you helped me get through the hard times.” There’s something about metal—you can pound your anger out with it in a way other forms of music don’t do. It’s a release for what you’re dealing with.
DN: What would you call the doc? It seems at once a love letter to the scene, an anthropological excavation and a cultural treatise.
Dubin: I’d call it sociology. I didn’t want it to be a film only metal-heads would see. So I approached it from really a sociological point of view. I knew if I showed individual types of people—not just interviewing rock stars—but interviewing the young people that were there, the fans, the ones who drew on denim jackets and made the flyers, somebody seeing it would go, “Oh, it took more than just talented musicians to make this thing take off. It took all these people continually going to shows and supporting these bands.”
DN: What are some music documentaries that influenced you?
Dubin: When I was a kid I saw “Woodstock” and it blew me away. The whole feeling of what Woodstock represented was captured, that electricity of Hendrix or Alvin Lee and Ten Years After playing “I’m Going Home”—I still think about that. That’s powerful filmmaking. For our film I wanted to get that. The movie that probably most influenced me for “Murder in the Front Row” is (Stacy Peralta’s 2001 skateboarding doc) “Dogtown and Z-Boys.” I love that film. I didn’t skateboard or grow up on the West Coast, but I was pulling for those young guys and gals who were creating a new language with skating. If there was anything I was thinking about making my movie it was that film.
DN: What’s next for you? Another doc, a feature?
Dubin: I’m working on stuff with Metallica, which is great. I’m going back into my old footage from 25 years ago of “A Year and a Half in the Life of Metallica.” There’s going to be a lot more film added to it. We shot tons, so there’s more interesting stuff going on that we didn’t get to show. It’s a great blessing for a filmmaker to be able to go back and uncover that footage.
Adam Dubin’s website: