DVDs | DJHistory.com

DVDs... What's on the goggle box? These are the movies, documentaries and other flickering shadows you should own.

Wild Style [1982]

“Daddy, where does hip hop come from?” Only a vague storyline, the real action is spotting babyfaced old-school legends get excitable. Late 1981, and rap, graffiti and breakdancing are bursting out of the Bronx, with block parties, MCing and incendiary DJ performances by Flash, Theodore, Jazzy Jay. (D.St is the faceless maestro cutting up Chic). Plus nuff 25th anniversary extras. Esssential.

Made in Sheffield [2004]

Fed on punk and drop-forges, Sheffield kids were different. Cabaret Voltaire blasted tape loops from a van, Ian Marsh soldered up his own synthesiser and Phil Oakey cut half his hair off. “We laughed at the bands who learnt to play three chords,” says Oakey. “We just used one finger.” Interviews and great archive footage document the bold Yorkshire experiment that became techno's roots.

Glastonbury [2006]

Now that Glastonbury is officially below the water table and populated entirely by Sunday supplement writers, you may want to re-live its more bonkers years on the box. Julien Temple collected 900 hours of home movies and spent a further four years filming till he had this magical compendium of gigs, blissful moments and random weirdness, right back to David Bowie in a cow-field.

Krush Groove [1985]

Run DMC quit the carwash to stalk Sheila E, a Fat Boy irons his laces, and 17-yr-old LL steals the show. Russell Simmons’ rap to riches story was always corny, but it's grown endearing with age. Shot in Disco Fever, with owner Sal Abatiello, DJ Sweet G and bouncer Mandingo, plus interludes in Danceteria. Rick Rubin is happy to play himself but Simmons hires the best looking actor he can afford.

Coogan's Bluff [1968]

Clint’s first go as a tough cop who plays by his own rules (etc, etc), escorting a prisoner from Rust-bucket Arizona to the depravity of NYC. A pedestrian TV flick turns wild when baddy escapes and leads Clint – in an acid haze – through a freak-out downtown clubscape: projections, body-paint, go-go girls and spinning vision, with the Electric Circus playing the Pigeon-Toed Orange Peel Club.

Downtown 81 [2001]

Few time and place combos would beat New York in 1981: art and music drip off the fire escapes. Spend a life in the day of graffiti genius Jean-Michel Basquiat as he walks its crumpled streets, searching for enlightenment, a beautiful girl and something to eat. Kid Creole, John Lurie, Suicide and Melle Mel pass by, not to mention Debbie Harry as a fairy bag-mother. Pure time travel.

Young Soul Rebels [1991]

Dodgy overacting and a shit script can’t prevent this film from getting something right. 1977, Jubilee year and London’s punks, skinheads and soulboys are going at it full volume. But too many themes are fighting for attention: a murder, racism, homophobia, love across the tracks and pirate radio. It’s really only the clothes and the great soundtrack that hold your attention, but they do it well.

Parliament-Funkadelic: Mothership Connection Live [1976]

“What’s happenin’ Houston?” It’s the way George saunters off his mothership, rocks his head and taps the handrail, or the guy in the audience passing a joint to the band, or the 30 people jamming onstage at the end: Maceo, Fred, Bernie Worrell, Bootsy banging a cowbell, the Parliaments belting it out – once you’ve seen this you may doubt you’ve ever been to a real concert.

Cocksucker Blues [1972]

When the Rolling Stones invented the job of ‘global drug-fuelled rock god’, they gave Robert Frank access all areas to make the recruitment film: it’s so compelling they locked it up on completion. Mick is super-sly, Keef is a gorgeous imp, Bianca is devastating. Jets, concerts, groupies, the finest narcotics known to humanity. No film will make you feel more like a rock star.

Gimme Shelter [1970]

The Stones are on a stage the size of a kitchen, facing a pitch-black hill with 300,000 hippy kids crushing forward. It’s a freezing night, the acid’s turned bad and the only security is the hells angels, who kick off each time they start Sympathy For The Devil. Then... someone’s killed on camera. The bitter end of flower power and you’re watching the dream crumble second by second. Amazing.

Blonde Venus [1932]

A fancy gin joint with a jazz jungle onstage and drums beating out a rumbling New Orleans groove. A troupe of Josephine Baker-style dancers stalk in, with massive afros, warpaint and spears, marching a gorilla. Surrounded, the gorilla takes off its head. It’s Marlene Dietrich! She puts on a huge blonde wig and sings a song about hot voodoo. And that’s just the first number.

Saturday Night Fever [1977]

Before this came out, disco was a caring, sharing family affair where everyone said excuse me and gave each other free acid punch; afterwards it was an evil, money-making craze with polyester slacks and the Bee Gees. Nik Cohn, who wrote the magazine piece it was based on, admitted recently that he made it all up. The 30th anniversary edition wheels in Bill and Frank for added laughs.

Kids [1995]

Underage drinking, drugging, snogging and fucking, with the dramatic bonus of HIV working its way through the cute cast. Larry Clark’s film is a portrait of New York’s baggy suburban rave generation – born in clubs like NASA and Caffeine. It launched Chloe Sevigny and Rosario Dawson and earnt Clark a fair share of moralising controversy. These days it’s just an episode of Skins.

Babylon — Dread Beat an' Blood [1980]

Britain is cold, wet, racist and jobless, your yard is a New Cross bomb site, all dead bricks and corrugated iron, and to top it all your boss is Mel Smith. But come the weekend your sound, Ital Lion, takes on the mighty Shaka. The classic London roots reggae time capsule, a peek back to the days of Ford Anglias and thunderous dub clubs, and a finely crafted movie into the bargain.

The Last Days of Disco [1998]

Don’t watch for the disco; it’s only here as a clever metaphor: representing flaming youth and foolish hedonism for some self-obsessed Manhattan rich kids, who make amoral choices and spout arch Woody-Allen-esque dialogue. When their lives crumble in regrets and infection, we get newsreel of the Comisky Park Disco Demolition riot. That’s right, a metaphor. Yeah, M... E...T...

54 [2005]

They missed key tunes, they dialled down the sex and drugs in favour of a yawnful Jersey boy bartender’s coming-of-age tale, and they left much of writer-director Mark Christopher’s vision in the editing bin, but somehow there’s a decent film left, thanks mainly to great styling, accurate sets and Mike Myers pitch-perfect turn as Studio 54 co-owner and door-whore legend Steve Rubell.

The Apple [1980]

The glitterballsiest musical ever, the fabulous lost link between Logan’s Run and Imagination’s shoulder pads. Back in 1980 the future was a vast cosmic disco barn filled with smiling teens dressed in xenon, singing terrible stadium rock; the devil runs the music biz and once you sign a deal he gets your soul and uses your record to hypnotise the world. Oh shit, it’s happening right now.

Klute [1971]

Movie buffs know Klute as the brilliant paranoid thriller that heralded American directors’ adoption of European ambiguities; we know it for a five-second appearance of DJing godfather Francis Grasso. The film’s verité style – real locations, real hookers – leaves New York looking wonderfully frayed, as lonely detective Donald Sutherland meets tart-with-the-smarts Jane Fonda.

Cruising [1980]

1979 and they’re murdering fags in New York’s leather bars; better call PC Pacino. Endure daft dialogue and lurking homophobia for priceless club scenes in the city’s sordid pre-AIDS free-for-all. Pacino dances in a bad vest, sniffs amyl, watches a greasy fist-fucking. When a shopkeeper asks him which colour hankie he wants for his back pocket, big Al goes home to think about it.

Maestro [2003]

Well-meaning but sloppy tribute to New York DJing’s founding fathers, with Mancuso et al interviewed, a little archive footage and a bunch of Garage-heads reminiscing endlessly about ‘the underground’. Noteworthy for the only filmed interview of Francis Grasso and Steve D’Acquisto, both of whom died soon after, though the sound and lighting is so bad they might as well have not bothered.