Summary
An overview of the infamous band and their career, although it’s too superficial for existing fans and not connected enough as an introduction.
Influential British post-punk group The Slits came up around the time that the Sex Pistols, The Buzzcocks and The Clash were defining the scene. Over the years, their ability to invoke mayhem and their unique fusion of dub and punk earned them a fierce reputation: “Four women that were like sticks of dynamite.” William E Badgley, himself a frontman for the hard rock group Federation X, follows up his 2011 documentary Kill All Redneck Pricks: A Documentary Film about a Band Called KARP with this surface overview of the notorious band.
Beginning with bassist Tess Pollitt flicking through a scrapbook tracing the early days of the band, Badgley mostly tells the story of The Slits through interviews with the surviving band members, Viv Albertine, Pollitt and Paloma McLardy (aka Palmolive), along with some choice friends and family. Sandwiched between these pieces are snippets of archival footage, performances pieces, and newly created videos set to their music. In the spirit of the band, the latter are populated with BIG LYRICS ON SCREEN, making the whole thing feel like the zine version of their career.
Which is where Badgley’s work becomes stuck between two worlds. On the one hand, this is a reasonably good summary of the brief career of The Slits, taking us from their origins, signing up to Island Records, collaborating with a 14-year-old Neneh Cherry, their split-up, life after the band, reunion, and Ari Up’s death in 2010. Yet there’s simply not enough detail for existing fans, and nowhere near enough context for people new to the band. If this is a zine, then it’s one that’s photocopied the Wikipedia page and remixed it slightly for a festival audience.
Also missing is any kind of lengthy opinions from Ari Up. While the front woman passed almost a decade ago, she has appeared in countless documentaries and TV shows over the years talking about her life and career. It’s a shame that Badgley wasn’t able to use any of that footage. Nevertheless, he includes her voice via archival pieces, and there’s a fair bit of that too. Don Letts recorded everything on Super 8, who was a DJ at the Roxy during the early days of the band. Some of this turned up in seminal 1978 film The Punk Rock Movie, which assembled his clips of a staggering number of performers.
A few years ago, Emma Garland wrote a terrific piece for Vice on how the riot grrrl movement of the 90s almost threatened to condemn the 1970s pioneers like The Slits and X-Ray Spex to the footnotes of punk. “The Slits are historically categorized within the 70s UK punk scene as a whole,” she argued “to the point where I wonder if they’ve become submerged in it almost.” Comparing the two eras, Garland added “[The Slits] didn’t define their music as feminist, it just was.” Which is perhaps where HERE TO BE HEARD works best, demonstrating a not-so-quiet revolution that didn’t aim to change the scene, it just did.
2017 | UK | DIR: William E. Badgley | WRITERS: William E. Badgley | CAST: Viv Albertine, Tess Pollitt, Paloma McLardy, Don Letts | RUNNING TIME: 86 minutes | DISTRIBUTOR: MIFF (AUS) | RELEASE DATE: 6 August 2018 (MIFF), 16 September 2018 (SUFF)
