BE GLAD FOR THE SONG HAS NO ENDING
Dir. Peter Neal, 1970
UK. 50 mins.
English
FEBRUARY 7TH-MIDNIGHT
FEBRUARY 19TH-10PM
FEBRUARY 24TH-7:30PM
This Rockuary, get ready to smell the patchouli! Although not as well-remembered as some of their peers, The Incredible String Band were an odd and pioneering Scottish psychedelic folk band whose incorporation of Middle Eastern instrumentation and open song structure was a huge influence on The Beatles, Stones, and Led Zeppelin. But while those bands only LARPED in weirdness, The ISB leaned full-tilt into it.
Partially filmed at the ancient Druid stone formation of Pentre Ifan, BE GLAD FOR THE SONG HAS NO ENDING is a half concert doc/ half folk horror film that documents the band at their creative peak. Starting off with several live performances and climaxing with a ritualistic short film that feels like a WICKER MAN precursor, the film is one of the most underseen chronicles of true sixties excess. UK magazine Weird Walk called it “a simultaneously daft and mesmerizing piece of homebrew cinema”, but a more pedestrian elevator pitch might be “THE SONG REMAINS THE SAME meets THE COLOR OF POMEGRANATES”. What else could you ask for?