Blowin’ Wind w/ Sam Dunn of Banger Films: “Our intention was to paint a different picture about metal than what had been painted before.”

In 2005, Sam Dunn brought the world of heavy metal to the big screen with his documentary Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey finally sharing the history of heavy metal in way that had never been done before. Sam and his company Banger Films have since gone on to release some award winning documentaries such as Iron Maiden’s Flight 666 and the Rush documentary Beyond the Lighted Stage. Banger Films also released an 11 episode series called Metal Evolution which took A Headbanger’s Journey a step further as it dissected various subgenres of metal and explored its history.

Sam recently took time out of his extremely busy schedule to talk with me about what it was like working with Iron Maiden, his past projects, and his future projects in the works such as an extreme metal episode of Metal Evolution, a documentary on Alice Cooper, and a documentary exploring Satan and Satanism in popular culture. I hope you’ll enjoy getting to know a little bit more about Sam Dunn.

Hi Sam. This is Don from the Great Southern Brainfart. How are you today?

I’m doing very good. How are you doing today?

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I’m doing great. Thanks so much for taking the time to talk to me today.

No worries. Forgive me for not knowing but is this an audio interview or radio or what?

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Actually, I’m old school man. I transcribe everything verbatim and edit for posting on my blog.

Oh ok. That’s cool. If you’re transcribing it I’ll try not to talk too fast. I tend to talk a lot so just tell me to slow down if you need me to [laughs].

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Sam, I absolutely love your work. You’re pretty much doing the things that guys like me wish we could be out doing. The first time I saw your work was on Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey. How long in the making was that project? That was a really extensive piece of work.

Scott McFayden and I both run Banger Films and we direct and produce together. We met back in 90’s in the music scene. Back in 1999 or 2000 I originally wanted to write a book about the history of heavy metal because I didn’t feel that there was a really good comprehensive history of the genre. Scott was working as a music supervisor in film and television and said, “What about a documentary? Has there ever been a really good documentary done on heavy metal music?” We discovered basically that there wasn’t and we were surprised. It was literally five years in total to do everything from raising the financing to filming, editing, and releasing the film. It was a really long journey and we got laughed out of a lot of board rooms when we walked and saying that we wanted to do a serious film about metal music [laughs]. Eventually we got there and it turned out that a lot of other people really wanted it to happen as well.

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I always felt that metal fans were painted as being meatheads and burnouts when for the most part we are an open minded and really intelligent group of people. Was your intention to paint a more positive image of metal fans and the bands in general?

Well, our intention was to paint a different picture about metal than what had been painted before. Prior to Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey, the only films that were about metal was Spinal Tap, Wayne’s World, and Decline of the Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years. Even a documentary like Decline, although groundbreaking in a sense, only got a small snapshot of what metal was about. When I saw all these glam metal guys hanging with tons of chicks on Sunset Strip, I said, “This isn’t the metal that I know. This isn’t like my experience as a metalhead.” I think inevitably it was going to be a positive picture because we knew that metal always got the short end of the stick. There was never a good film to kind of understand why people are attracted to this music and why people are so passionate about making it.

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I remember seeing the Decline movie back in like 1988 and I can remember thinking, “Most of these guys are pretty dumb. Is this who I’m going to be compared to?”

[laughs] One of the things that we really wanted to point out is that most of the guys that I hung out with in high school that listened to metal were not burnouts. They were really into music, art, and even sports. It’s just that metal was the kind of music that they loved. That was the metal community that I grew up in and we just wanted to make a film that reflected that.

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I loved that in Metal: A Headbangers Journey that there was some attention to the detail of the fans themselves. It wasn’t just about the bands and I was curious to hear from your perspective, how much metal fans have changed over the years if at all.

It was really important for us to talk about the fans because we were shocked at how many music documentaries you see and there’s not really anything about the fans. The fans are just kind of treated as pawns who worship their musical heroes with no real opinions or ideas of their own. As you know, metal fans are highly opinionated and generally very knowledgeable about the music they listen to so that was a real important part of our movie. In terms of fans changing, I think the main thing that has happened is that metal has become a bigger part of the musical fabric. It’s still underground but a lot more people know about it now. It’s just the nature of media and how much access people have to music. You find kids who listen to a little bit of metal, some hip hop, some DJ music or whatever. When I was a teenager it was tribe against tribe. You were either a metalhead, or a pop fan, or a skater, or a jock. You really couldn’t be all at once [laughs]. I think now it’s changed. You’ll see some kids at a Lamb of God show and they may not listen to metal 24/7 but they still go to the shows and listen to certain metal bands.

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Sam, you did so many interviews throughout the course of your journey from Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey to now.  Are there any particular ones that you look back on and are disappointed that they turned out the way they did?

Yeah, there’s a few. When you do 300 interviews, they’re not all going to be great [laughs]. That’s just the law of averages. I was a disappointed when we interviewed Andy Johns who is a well known producer. He worked on some of the early Led Zeppelin records and because we couldn’t’ get any of the guys in Led Zeppelin, this was about as close as we could get. It was just unfortunate because I don’t think he really understood who we were or what we were doing and frankly, he didn’t seem to care. I remember walking out that one thinking, “Wow, that might have been a complete waste of time.” [laughs]

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How about the flip side of that question? Were there any interviews that maybe you didn’t expect too much out of and they ended up exceeding your expectations?

One of the best, most surprising interviews we did was with Arthur Brown, the British rock performance artist from the 60’s. He’s a musician that I don’t think a lot of people in North American know much about but he was really doing some spectacular things in his live performances long before Alice Cooper or Kiss was. We went to London to meet with him and we talked about what he did and I was just blown away by how progressive he was. He had this helmet that he would light on fire and he just didn’t seem to care about what else was going on around him. Musically, he did his own thing. He was super articulate and super friendly so I definitely learned a lot. I really learned a lot while making this series, especially about older bands that I may have over looked when I was just a thrash obsessed teenager in the 80’s [laughs]. There’s some great old stuff out there.

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Sam, you’ve got a new project in the works these days. What can you tell me about it?

Well, our latest project was the 11 episode show Metal Evolution on the history of metal which did really well. We got a lot of response from the fans who felt that one of the genres that was missing was extreme metal and we agreed. I’m a fan of that heavier end of the spectrum and the networks just found it too heavy for viewership. We’ve launched an Indie Go Go campaign to raise money to create the extreme metal episode because the fans want it and we want it too. The heavy metal family tree was the spine of the Metal Evolution series broken down into 26 sub genres and we did 11 of them.

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While I’m not a fan of extreme metal myself, I can respect and appreciate its importance to the genre. Why was it that VH1 Classics couldn’t see that enough to back you?

We originally proposed an extreme metal episode when we approached them about making the series but they felt that their viewership is generally a little older. Their sweet spot is like KISS, Ted Nugent, Aerosmith, Alice Cooper, and even Metallica so thrash was about as heavy as they wanted to go. We felt that for young metal fans, extreme metal is heavy metal to them and what they are most excited about. Also, the series is about the evolution of heavy metal and the influences that connect one band to the next and one scene to the next. It just seemed ludicrous to us that there wasn’t an episode on extreme metal because extreme metal is really the sub genre that is pushing metal forward and testing the limits of metal music. The story of metal evolution just feels incomplete without it.

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So why take this to the fans to get their support in making this episode?

I guess it just seems to make sense because extreme metal is the most underground sub genre of metal. If there is one sub genre that needs to come from the grassroots, it’s extreme metal. We put it out there and said to metal fans, “If you all really want to see this, then we’re all going to have to chip in to make it happen.” If we had the money to just pull out of our pockets and make this episode we would but the fact of the matter is that we can’t do that. We literally move from one project to the next.

Metal Evolution – The Lost Episode: Extreme Metal from Banger Films on Vimeo.

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VH1 seems to really supportive of heavy metal music but with limitations. Do you feel that sometimes it does a bit more harm than good for metal music to not be broadly accepted.

Here’s the nitty gritty and it’s not all that exciting. It all comes down to business. The way it works is that networks have advertisers and advertisers cater towards a particular demographic so networks want to create shows that cater to that demographic. In the eyes of VH1 Classic, the demographic of their advertisers is older so that ties their hands to go outside of that demographic. VH1 could have thousands of fans watching their network that are fans of extreme metal and they wouldn’t even know it because that’s not how their advertising dollars work. We’re not bitter about it though. We’re friends with the people over at Vh1 Classics, they’ve been enormously supportive us and have shows three of our documentaries and Metal Evolution. There is no other network in the US that would show an 11 episode series on metal so we’re pretty pleased. We’re not kicking and screaming in the sandbox here. We’re just saying that it’s unfortunate that they don’t want to do this episode. We think it’s important and so do the fans so we’ve just got to find another way.

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I’m glad you reminded me of this stuff because it’s easy for me to get hung up in my fandom sometimes and just be like, “Why won’t you play this or this?”

Exactly. It’s not that simple. It’s like Gene Simmons has always said. “It’s the music… business.” [laughs]

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Sam, I wanted to ask you a little about some of your other projects, especially the Iron Maiden Flight 666 documentary. Just getting to meet Maiden would be a dream come true for a fan but you actually got to travel with them, work with them, and become one of them. Was it hard for you to step out of the roll of fan and be an unbiased filmmaker?

Well, luckily I had kind of confronted that challenge back in 2004 when I first met Bruce Dickinson. We did an interview with him on stage at the Hammersmith Odeon for A Headbanger’s Journey. I remember that moment thinking, “Ok. I’ve really got to keep my shit together here.” [laughs] It was pretty fucking exciting. I mean, these guys were boyhood heroes of mine. I kind of felt like I got it out of the way back then so by the time we got to do Flight 666 I had already met Steve and Adrian so I knew the band and their manager Rod a little better. By the time we got to start making that film, we felt a little bit more comfortable but you always struggle with that line when you’re a fan. You can’t help but have those geek out moments [laughs]. When I was sitting behind Nicko and filming him drumming for a few nights, I was like, “I can’t believe I’m three inches away from this guy. This is fucking incredible.” [laughs]

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Did seeing Iron Maiden in this setting change your opinions of the band one way or the other?

I think it made me really respect how much of a business and a well oiled operation the Maiden machine is. To be able to put the entire band, all the crew, and all the equipment on a 767 for seven weeks, fly to a dozen countries and play like 23 shows, that’s a huge undertaking. There are a lot of risks involved and a lot of planning. It’s a logistical nightmare. I just came away from that tour saying, “Wow. These guys are really professionals.” There’s a reason why Iron Maiden is one of the biggest bands on the planet. They’ve kept it together, they’re well managed, and they care about the music. They care about the fans and they know that constant touring is a way to maintain that connection with the fans. I think I just got a much broader perspective on this band. These guys are more than the band that I was air bassing to on my bed when I was 12 [laughs].

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Flight 666 really captured the hard work and energy that Iron Maiden puts into everything. Those guys aren’t young either and yet they’re still out there giving 110%.

Yeah. I mean, that’s why they’ve survived. Early on, Iron Maiden learned the value of being a great live band and ironically coming to where we are now with declining record sales and what not, I think that being a live band has become even more important than it used to be. Bands have to make their money playing live. Ya know, when you and I were teenagers, we would go out and buy a record, bring it home, put it on, and just sit there reading the lyrics and what not. We had this kind of connection with the band and even entered this imaginary world. I don’t think that young fans do that anymore because now you just download a song from iTunes or somewhere else, you put it on your iPod and you walk down the street or something. There isn’t really this kind of same in depth connection so I think the live show has become the only place where fans can really have that experience now. Where they can get something that is more than this digital thing that exists on their computer.

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On the Evolution Series, you covered the Glam/Hair Metal genre. I know you’re not a fan of that genre so much but I was curious as to if you came away from that episode with maybe a new appreciation for any of the acts?

Well, I went into that episode a hater [laughs]. I went into that episode not being a fan of the music and I had a lot of assumptions about the musicians in that genre. I felt like they were boy bands put together by labels and that they didn’t really have a vision for what they wanted to do. I thought that they just kind of got into it to make a bunch of money but as I started to meet more of the musicians, especially guys like Rikki Rockett (Poison drummer) and Bobby Blotzer (Ratt drummer), I learned that a lot of these guys really did have a real vision of what they wanted to do, especially Poison. Rikki said it best when he said, “We had a fuck us for fight us attitude.” They knew then that they were getting under people’s skin. That’s really a punk rock attitude so I came away from that with an appreciation that they had a vision and they had a plan. Sadly, that’s what so many bands lack. I still can’t stand the music but I came away with a lot more respect for the people that make the music [laughs].

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You’ve worked with Maiden, Rush, and many other great bands. Is there another band out there that you would love to focus in on and do a film around them?

Well, right now we are doing a documentary on Alice Cooper which is coming along really great. It’s a remarkable story and we’ve spent a lot of time with Alice interviewing him about his career. We’ve talked to members of the original Alice Cooper Band, his long time manager Shep Gordon. We’ve even talked to Elton John and Wayne Kramer of the MC5 about Alice. We’ve met some really interesting people. The plan is to have that released in the fall of 2013. Beyond that, the sore thumb that is standing out there is that nobody has done a real documentary on AC/DC.

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That would be an amazing story. I mean, they are still huge to this day and very relevant in the hard rock/metal world.

I mean, you want to talk about a fucking huge rock band? AC/DC makes Metallica look like they’re in kindergarten. Black Ice was one of the biggest albums of the last decade and they still have this huge following yet nobody has really told their story. I would love to sink my teeth into that one.

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Sam, last but not least, I heard you are working on a project called “Satan.” What’s this one about?

We are. In addition to the Alice Cooper documentary, we are doing a feature documentary on the devil. It’s focusing on the devil’s role in popular culture so we’re looking at film, television, literature and so on. It sort of looks at how films like The Exorcist and Rosemary’s Baby played a huge role in shaping our imagination of who is the devil and who is the power of the devil. We’re looking at the history of the Church of Satan and what that was and why it had such an impact in the middle of the hippie explosion. Then were also looking at the whole 80’s Satanic panic that happened in America with all the right wing government cracking down on heavy metal music and Dungeons and Dragons and then on through to present day. Most people don’t know this but there are more people receiving exorcisms in America than ever in this history of the country. We are taking a turn into a topic that isn’t just about music. It’s about something much bigger and we’re really excited about it. It’s a big a step forward for us.

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Oh man. Let’s not forget the big Geraldo Rivera “Exploring Satan’s Underground” thing from the 80’s.

[laughs] I am still trying to get an interview with Geraldo but I haven’t had any luck so far. I did interview Sally Jessie Raphael though [laughs]. She also ran specials on Satan and the youth.

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Sam, thanks so much for doing this interview man. It was a great time talking to you. Hopefully we’ll have a beer together sometime.

You got it Don. Next time I’m in Atlanta. Thanks a lot.

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