Written by Caballero Oscuro
In 2004, a scrappy concert promoter named Chang Weisberg set out to pull off a seemingly impossible feat: a live performance by all members of the hip-hop super group, the Wu-Tang Clan. The Clan ran nine deep at the time plus 10th associate Cappadonna, and due to their successful solo careers, various touring schedules, and always outrageous behavior of mercurial member Ol’ Dirty Bastard (aka ODB), the odds of success were extremely low. Further complicating matters, the scheduled Wu-Tang set was part of a large festival bill presented at a non-dedicated concert venue, creating a huge infrastructure set-up nightmare. Somewhere along the line, someone had the crazy idea to capture all of the chaos on film before and during the show, resulting in this completely riveting documentary.
Make no mistake, this is not a Wu-Tang concert video. In fact, there’s not even any Clan concert performance footage in the documentary. Instead, this is the story of how Chang planned the massive Rock The Bells production and cajoled all of the members to attend. The film shows Chang at work in the preproduction stage, discussing the show’s plan with civic leaders, arranging for security, and lining up his formidable talent roster. It also shows him and his crew at work in some street-level promotion, dodging cops to blanket the area’s lightpoles with posters. While the planning footage is interesting, it drags on a bit too long as we anticipate the main event, the actual day of the show.
To pull off his impossible dream, Chang attempted to book all of the Wu-Tang members individually as solo artists. Once he had them all signed, he floated the idea of the group performance to the Wu-Tang don, the RZA. RZA keeps tight control of the Wu-Tang brand and was initially miffed that Chang tried an end-run to deviously set up the group show, but finally came around when he realized what a historic and special event it could be if successful. Unfortunately, the recently paroled ODB continued to live up to his reputation as the biggest wildcard, exhibiting his usual erratic behavior as he kept promoters and his Wu brothers wondering whether he would actually show up. As usual with the Wu, nothing is ever certain until they actually set foot on stage, so no amount of planning could accurately predict the final outcome.
Article comments