Dr. Hook

I'm not saying this little live DVD by a largely forgotten band is better than the abovementioned films by the likes of Scorsese, Godard, Pennebaker, and Bogdanovich. What I am saying, though, is that none of these films has provided me with the same feeling of entertainment verging on sheer life-affirming joy as has Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show: Live, and that none has so consistently reminded me what playing music onstage should, at its very highest point, feel like.

I want to explain why to you but, before writing another word, I'd like to promise you something: At no point will I make any kind of postmodern bid to revise the 1970s rock canon to place Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show anywhere remotely near its creative center. A strained case could be made I guess, but to make such a case would involve a kind of pretense that is the direct antithesis to the music of Dr. Hook, which is possibly the most unpretentious rock music ever recorded. Furthermore, I promise to make no attempt to paint Dr. Hook as anything other than what they were: a down-and-dirty Jersey bar band whose tunes more often than not crossed the line into novelty rock, an outlet for the pop-lyrical efforts of countercultural humorist and children's author Shel Silverstein, and, later, a banal disco band specializing in workmanlike ballads such as "When You're in Love with a Beautiful Woman."

“Dennis, We’ve Been Crying Too Much”: Dr. Hook and the Untold Story of the Best Rock Movie Ever | Part Two