Moby first came to my attention as a rave music producer during the 90's for the hit track Go which like many of the stand out dance tracks, registered in the mainstream pop charts globally. Today its still considered a classic, particularly by those were partying when it arrived. Today Moby is more recognisable as the guy who release the Play album which sound-tracked a million TV commercials and no doubt packed his bank account.
This is a well financed bio-doc narrated by himself and for this reason it fails. First off we cover his childhood which has him apparently recollecting events from aged 3. We were all aged 3 but seriously how can anyone reliably recall anything from that age? Let alone judge the dynamics between his mother and father? We are also led to believe that his affinity with animals was due to his family dynamic. Again this is supposed to be him talking as a 3 year old? Some people, such as those on the autistic spectrum simply prefer animal company because its less taxing than being around animals. And there is an odd disconnect when he talks about people in his life. He mentions a friend was stabbed to death when discussing a disused factory he lived in, his next line line is I loved living there. Eh? No mention of the circumstances around the murder or how it impacted him emotionally, only that he loved where it happened? There is something off about the tone of this doc or rather the narrator. Another gripe is what I read as faux humbleness. There is a constant thread of him saying I never expected any success, if that is the case why do it? And for so long. Its as if he refuses to accept he was ambitious, despite claiming his dream was a mansion. In terms of his musical career, its clear that his biggest successes have been making sample based music. His own Animal Rights album flopped hard. That is using other peoples tracks, most of whom won't see a penny. This was particularly striking when he plays with an orchestra with a black choir. And it strikes you he was basically a culture vulture as the rappers say.
The production quality is fairly high but a huge chunk of the running time is made up of animations and what looks like CGI in order to pad out the time to 90 mins. A 90 mins I never made it to as it switched it off after about 60. This came across as quite a tone deaf and so self focused that there is very little emotional depth to it. It seems to be trying to suggest this is a story of an underdog who made it by sheer luck as opposed to someone who spent 15 years making music before making it by discovering sampling, which ironically could only have happened in the 90s. I didn't come away from this liking him any better.
This is a well financed bio-doc narrated by himself and for this reason it fails. First off we cover his childhood which has him apparently recollecting events from aged 3. We were all aged 3 but seriously how can anyone reliably recall anything from that age? Let alone judge the dynamics between his mother and father? We are also led to believe that his affinity with animals was due to his family dynamic. Again this is supposed to be him talking as a 3 year old? Some people, such as those on the autistic spectrum simply prefer animal company because its less taxing than being around animals. And there is an odd disconnect when he talks about people in his life. He mentions a friend was stabbed to death when discussing a disused factory he lived in, his next line line is I loved living there. Eh? No mention of the circumstances around the murder or how it impacted him emotionally, only that he loved where it happened? There is something off about the tone of this doc or rather the narrator. Another gripe is what I read as faux humbleness. There is a constant thread of him saying I never expected any success, if that is the case why do it? And for so long. Its as if he refuses to accept he was ambitious, despite claiming his dream was a mansion. In terms of his musical career, its clear that his biggest successes have been making sample based music. His own Animal Rights album flopped hard. That is using other peoples tracks, most of whom won't see a penny. This was particularly striking when he plays with an orchestra with a black choir. And it strikes you he was basically a culture vulture as the rappers say.
The production quality is fairly high but a huge chunk of the running time is made up of animations and what looks like CGI in order to pad out the time to 90 mins. A 90 mins I never made it to as it switched it off after about 60. This came across as quite a tone deaf and so self focused that there is very little emotional depth to it. It seems to be trying to suggest this is a story of an underdog who made it by sheer luck as opposed to someone who spent 15 years making music before making it by discovering sampling, which ironically could only have happened in the 90s. I didn't come away from this liking him any better.