Can films ever capture the visceral excitement of music? The best music documentaries give it a right good go! We love a film that educates and entertains in equal measure about loved musical artists, but there’s something special about finding acts you never knew of.
More so when the acts in question are female bands on our doorstep here in Scotland – many of who have been, till now, unfairly omitted from the histories of Scottish music. Since Yesterday: The Untold Story Of Scotland’s Girl Bands tells the story of these bands and more. SNACK caught up with Carla J. Easton and Blair Young to find out more about what will be one of the big turns at the Edinburgh International Film Festival (it’s the festival’s closing film), and wider across the country this autumn!
Carla, this is a story that’s been personal to you for however many years, but when did the process of the film – moving from an idea to reality – begin?
CJE: When we came up with the idea, a week later, we were doing our first interview. Coming from such a DIY background [as we do], you don’t hang about; you get cracking, to see if there’s something there in the idea. We had the conversation and a week later, we tracked down Jeanette McKinley and we were at her house in Dunbar speaking to her.
Blair, you’ve got a great track record in working with well-known Scottish bands. Was this project a challenge for you?
BY: It was definitely something different and something I wanted to move into. Music’s my first love. So that stuff’s never a chore, but I had the desire to do something with more social worth. I guess all music has a social worth, in a way, but opposed to promoting a band specifically or serving a band’s particular fan base, I wanted to move sideways and to work with a social conscience.
CJE: You can’t make a documentary about women making music without highlighting the struggles that still go on today. It would be irresponsible to sugarcoat it. And it wouldn’t be fair to the artists of today or the artists in the film.
In the film, for the 70s, 80s and 90s bands, fanzines and fan culture was vital. The way we connect now and engage has changed so much. Do you think it’s easier now for like-minded people to get together?
CJE: It’s quite interesting when you look at organisations like Popgirlz, which exist solely as a private Facebook group. It’s almost like that’s the nineties fanzine version that bands like like Lung Leg and Hello Skinny talk about so passionately, that’s their version of it.
BY: As the internet usually ends up being, it’s the best and the worst. It’s great that you can just make music and get it out there, and that should be a good thing. But if everyone’s doing that – not that it’s a popularity contest – you can get lost. It’s probably like being a wee band at SXSW. It’s very easy to get lost in this huge, massive music event over the course of a week.
Were there any scenes for you two that cut to the heart of what you wanted to achieve?
CJE: My favourite bit of archive? I think we both love the photo of The McKinleys, where it’s not posed and someone’s just caught them at the side and they’re dancing and holding hands.
Because Jeanette just spoke so fondly of Sheila; she’s still so in awe of her sister and it’s just the perfect photo to encapsulate their bond.
BY: Yeah. There are quite a few bits. It’s so exciting to get bits of archive and jailbreak stuff out of the BBC. I know some of the Peel Sessions have been brought back out in the last decade or so, but this footage and other bits of footage wouldn’t have been seen in 50 years. It was exciting.
It’s also a film about female friendship, and I don’t think the media carries that story a lot with female groups?
CJE: Yeah. And I think it’s just that. The bands were going, ‘I just asked my pals, do you have a drum kit? Cool. Can you play it? No, it doesn’t matter. Let’s form a band.’ I mean, that was how Teen Canteen started. We didn’t set out to form a girl band. And that’s how most bands start: can you play guitar? I know three chords. Cool. You’re in my band.
BY: I’m glad there’s a strong element of that in the documentary because it’s easy to focus on the friction between people, say Jagger and Richards, John and Paul, or Liam and Noel. That’s what documentaries normally focus on.
Are you getting excited about the release now?
CJE: I don’t know what I’ll be like on the day, but I think it’ll be quite an emotional celebration for us all and hopefully a powerful statement. Selling out in 15 minutes. All these women together there at the premiere, from across the decades, is a powerful statement. And I just can’t wait for more people to see the film when it’s out in October. It’s not our film, really. It’s their film. I just want them to be happy with it.
BY: Yeah. Those moments where I’m too consumed by worry about what people are going to think, that’s sort of egotistical, because the only people that matter are the people on screen. And I think, I hope, it’s going to be wonderful for people to see them and for them to feel that.
CJE: I think everyone’s going to fall in love with them. They’re all so great, they’re so brilliant. It’s such a great mix of personalities and genres of music, which I think demonstrates there’s no one way to do stuff. It’s wonderful to show there’s so many people involved in it and they’re real humans, just real human experiences and, yeah, it’s their film. I just hope they’re happy with it.
Photo Credit: Euan Robertson
