Scott Crary | |
|---|---|
 Crary at the 2005 Tribeca Film Festival | |
| Born | Scott Aaron Crary April 12, 1978 |
| Other names | S. A. Crary |
| Occupation(s) | Director, producer, writer |
| Years active | 2004–present |
| Website | hungerartist |
Scott Crary (also known as S. A. Crary; born 1978) is an American film director, producer and writer, best known for having directed, produced, filmed and edited the film Kill Your Idols , a documentary examining three decades of New York art punk bands.
Crary's debut film, Kill Your Idols , features such noted no wave and art punk bands as Sonic Youth, Swans, DNA, Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, Suicide, Black Dice, Gogol Bordello, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Liars, among others. The film received the award for Best Documentary at the 2004 Tribeca Film Festival [1] [2] and was subsequently screened at over 50 international film festivals, before being released theatrically in 2006. It was acquired for distribution in North America by Palm Pictures, [3] in Europe by Minerva Pictures/RARO Video, [4] and in Japan by Uplink. [5] Kill Your Idols was also acquired for television by Showtime and Sundance Channel. [6] [7]
Crary served on the jury of the 2005 Tribeca Film Festival alongside Alan Cumming, Whoopi Goldberg, Darren Arronofsky, Tom Wolfe, Damon Dash, Jeff Bezos, and others. [8]
In 2005, Nokia commissioned Crary to direct the short film Perdu Dans La Ville, shot entirely on Nokia 6682 Imaging Smartphones. [9]
In 2007, Crary directed the music video for the song "Story Goes First" by the band Katamine. The video starred Kurt Feldman of the indie pop band The Pains of Being Pure at Heart. [10]
In May 2008, Crary's film, Kill Your Idols , was named on Black Book Magazine's list of 'Iconic and Influential Music Documentaries', alongside such films as Dig!, I Am Trying to Break Your Heart: A Film About Wilco, 1991: The Year Punk Broke, Meeting People Is Easy, and The Devil and Daniel Johnston . [11] In May 2011, the film was also included on Nylon Magazine's list of 'Top Music Documentaries'. [12]
Crary produced the 2010 documentary film William S. Burroughs: A Man Within , featuring Iggy Pop, John Waters, Patti Smith, Gus Van Sant, David Cronenberg, Jello Biafra, John Giorno, Genesis P-Orridge, Laurie Anderson, and others. William S. Burroughs: A Man Within premiered at the 2010 Slamdance Film Festival and was acquired for distribution in North America by Oscilloscope Laboratories, in Australia by Madman Entertainment, in Germany by Neue Visionen, and in France by Arte. [13]
In 2011, Crary produced an episode of the PBS series Independent Lens, hosted by America Ferrara. [14]
In 2013, Crary's film, Kill Your Idols , was included in the permanent archives of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. [15]
Crary served as a producer on the 2017 film Queercore: How to Punk a Revolution , a feature documentary on Queercore directed by Yony Leyser. [16] [17] The film features interviews with Bruce LaBruce, Kathleen Hanna, Kim Gordon, Rick Castro, John Waters, Peaches, Dennis Cooper, and others. [18] [19] [20] Queercore: How to Punk a Revolution premiered at Sheffield Doc/Fest on June 12, 2017 and was acquired for television by Arte in France and by ZDF in Germany. [21] [22] It was announced on February 9, 2018, that all U.S. rights for the film had been acquired by distributor Altered Innocence. [23] It was released theatrically on September 23, 2018, and on DVD, Blu-ray and VOD on January 8, 2019. [24] [25]
In 2018, Crary produced Fire Music , a feature documentary on free jazz, directed by Tom Surgal and featuring Cecil Taylor, Ornette Coleman, Prince Lasha, Carla Bley, Bobby Bradford, Sonny Simmons, and others. [26] Fire Music premiered at the 56th New York Film Festival on September 29, 2018 [27] [28] [29] and was released theatrically on September 10, 2021. [30] The film was acquired by The Criterion Collection and released on VOD on June 1, 2022. [31]
On January 3, 2019, Crary was announced as producer of an upcoming feature documentary on Jeffrey Lee Pierce and his band The Gun Club. [32] The film, entitled Elvis From Hell , will feature original interviews with Nick Cave, Debbie Harry, Mick Harvey, Jim Jarmusch, Mark Lanegan, Moby, Kid Congo Powers, Jack White, and others. [33]
In addition to his film work, Crary has been involved extensively in advertising as well, working with companies such as Nokia, [34] Mazda, [35] Guitar Center, [36] Bacardi, [37] Ray-Ban, [38] The Contrarian Media, [39] Apple, Seagram's Gin [40] and others.
Crary has been exhibited at numerous museums and art institutions internationally. His work has been presented at the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona, [41] the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal, [42] the Zeitgeist Multi-Disciplinary Arts Center in New Orleans, [43] the Pera Museum in Istanbul, [44] and London's Institute of Contemporary Arts. [45] In 2005, Sight & Sound's Stephen Dalton characterized Crary's experimental video pieces as "short meditative loops" that "often deliver a kōan-like punchline." [46]
In 2013, Crary announced he had begun authoring "a book of illustrated short stories" called Children Remember. [47] The title of the book is an allusion to the song of the same name by the band Circus Mort, which was fronted by Michael Gira who later formed Swans, a band featured in Crary's film Kill Your Idols . [48]
On April 16, 2015, Crary previewed selections from a forthcoming conceptual photo book which depicts the former New York City residences of celebrated creative personalities, such as Jean-Michel Basquiat, William S. Burroughs, Diane Arbus, Bob Dylan, J.D. Salinger, Mark Rothko, Nico, and others. [49] [50]
Although more significantly known for his subsequent film work, Crary at first came to public attention in the mid to late 1990s as a hip-hop turntabilist, mixtape deejay and occasional producer, using the stage name DJ S.T.R.E.S.S. During this time, he performed as a supporting act on tours for such artists as De La Soul, Jungle Brothers, Smif-n-Wessun, Heltah Skeltah, and Chuck D of Public Enemy. [51] He also released a number of self-produced mixtapes, which are notable for featuring some of the earliest appearances of artists like El-P, Mos Def, and Eminem, as well as original freestyles by The Roots, KRS-One, and Jeru The Damaja. [51] [52] As a member of the Universal Zulu Nation and an affiliate of the Native Tongues, [53] [54] Crary was associated with the consciousness movement in hip-hop. [55]
In 2006, the Belgian graphic design agency Kidnap Your Designer chose its name as a reference to Crary's film Kill Your Idols . [56] [57]
Footage of Crary's film Kill Your Idols was incorporated into the music video for the song "Window In The Skies" by the band U2.
In the 2011 novel Απόψε θα χιονίσει, θα το δεις, Greek author Daphne Manousou based the character of Edd on Crary. [58] [59]
In 2012, a bar named Kill Your Idol (in homage to Kill Your Idols ) opened in Miami's South Beach neighborhood, promoting itself as "a throw back to the emerging No Wave movement of the late 70s." [60] A framed poster of Crary's film hangs over the bar there.
In April 2012, artist Seth Kim-Cohen used Crary's film Kill Your Idols as a basis for his solo exhibition, Tomorrow Is The Question? Is the Question!, at the Audio Visual Arts (AVA) Gallery in New York. [61]
Lydia Lunch credited Crary as the inspiration for her 2012-2013 "Retro/Virus" concert tour. [62]
In 2013, Crary was included in the books Resonances: Noise and Contemporary Music, published by Bloomsbury Publishing, [63] and The Music Documentary: Acid Rock to Electropop, published by Routledge. [64]
Crary was included in the 2014 book Fight Back: Punk, Politics and Resistance, published by Manchester University Press. [65]
In 2015, Crary was included in the book Tranquillo, non importa, published in Italy by Edizioni Sette Città. [66]
In 2016, Crary was included in the book Downtown Manhattan 78-82: De la No Wave aux Dancefloors, published in France by Le Texte Vivant. [67]
In February 2016, Norwegian band Karokh premiered the song "Boogies", inspired by Crary's film Kill Your Idols . [68]
In 2017, Crary was included in the book Culturcide and Non-Identity across American Culture, published by Rowman & Littlefield. [69]
In 2020, Crary was included in Jonathan Rhodes Lee's book Film Music in the Sound Era, published by Routledge. [70]
Crary lives in the Brooklyn Heights neighborhood of New York City. [71] He has a dog named Kafka, after the author Franz Kafka. [72]
Scott Crary is the great-great-great-great-grandson of 19th century poet and abolitionist Oringe Smith Crary. [73]
He is also cousin to geophysicist and Arctic explorer Albert Paddock Crary, the first person to have set foot on both the North and South Poles. [74]
| Year | Film | Functioned as | Notes | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Director | Producer | Writer | Cinematographer | Editor | |||
| 2004 | Kill Your Idols | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Awarded Best Documentary at the 2004 Tribeca Film Festival |
| 2005 | Perdu Dans La Ville | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Short film. Produced in promotion with Nokia [75] | |
| 2006 | Huldufólk 102 | Yes | |||||
| Kill Your Idols: More. | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Companion featurette released on the DVD of the 2004 film Kill Your Idols | |
| 2007 | Berlin | Yes | Camera Operator | ||||
| 2008 | Beautiful Losers | Consultant | |||||
| 2009 | The Constant Dream of the Blinded Eye | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Short film. Produced for Babelgum TV [76] | |
| 2010 | William S. Burroughs: A Man Within | Yes | Associate Producer | ||||
| 2011 | Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels of a Tribe Called Quest | Special Thanks | |||||
| 2013 | A Girl and a Gun | Yes | Additional Cinematography [77] | ||||
| 2015 | Stretch and Bobbito: Radio That Changed Lives | Special Thanks | |||||
| 2016 | Offal | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Companion featurette released on the DVD reissue of the 2004 film Kill Your Idols |
| 2017 | Queercore: How to Punk a Revolution | Yes | Consulting Producer / Executive Producer [22] [78] | ||||
| 2021 | Fire Music | Yes | Co-Producer [26] | ||||
| TBA | Elvis From Hell | Yes | |||||
| TBA | The Sum of the Prey | Yes | Yes | Yes | Narrative film. In development [79] | ||
| Year | Series | Functioned as | Notes | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Director | Producer | Writer | |||
| 2005 | The Instant Talk Show | Yes | Yes | Co-Director; Episode: "Pilot" Guest starring Philip Seymour Hoffman and Ben Lee | |
| 2011 | Independent Lens | Yes | Associate Producer; Episode: "Season 12, Episode 14" Hosted by America Ferrara | ||
| 2016 | Vinyl | Music consultant; Episode: "Pilot" | |||
| TBA | Break North | Yes | Yes | In development [80] | |
| Year | Song | Musician | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2002 | "Warsaw" | Cat Power | Director, cinematographer |
| 2007 | "Window in the Skies" | U2 | Contributing Cinematographer |
| 2007 | "Story Goes First" | Katamine | Director, writer, cinematographer, editor |
No wave was an avant-garde music genre and visual art scene that emerged in the late 1970s in Downtown New York City. The term was a pun based on the rejection of commercial new wave music. Reacting against punk rock's recycling of rock and roll clichés, no wave musicians instead experimented with noise, dissonance, and atonality, as well as non-rock genres like free jazz, funk, and disco. The scene often reflected an abrasive, confrontational, and nihilistic world view.
Yeah Yeah Yeahs are an American indie rock band formed in New York City in 2000. The group is composed of vocalist and pianist Karen O, guitarist and keyboardist Nick Zinner, and drummer Brian Chase. They are complemented in live performances by second guitarist David Pajo, who joined as a touring member in 2009 and replaced Imaad Wasif, who had previously held the role. According to a 2004 interview that aired during their appearance on ABC's Live from Central Park SummerStage series, the band's name was taken from modern New York City vernacular.
Queercore is a cultural/social movement that began in the mid-1980s as an offshoot of the punk subculture and a music genre that comes from punk rock. It is distinguished by its discontent with society in general, and specifically society's disapproval of the LGBT community. Queercore expresses itself in a DIY style through magazines, music, writing and film.
A punk zine is a zine related to the punk subculture and hardcore punk music genre. Often primitively or casually produced, they feature punk literature, such as social commentary, punk poetry, news, gossip, music reviews and articles about punk rock bands or regional punk scenes.
Pansy Division is an American queercore band formed in San Francisco, California, in 1991 by guitarist/singer/songwriter Jon Ginoli along with bassist Chris Freeman.
Lydia Lunch is an American singer, poet, writer, actress and self-empowerment speaker. Her career began during the 1970s New York City no wave scene as the singer and guitarist of Teenage Jesus and the Jerks.
Limp Wrist is an American punk rock band, who formed in 1998. Featuring members of Los Crudos, Hail Mary, Devoid of Faith, By the Throat, and Kill the Man Who Questions, the band plays short, fast hardcore music, and covers themes concerning the gay community in their live performances and lyrics. They are an openly gay band and they identify as part of the "queercore" punk subculture. The band declared in Frontiers magazine, "We put the 'core' back in 'Queercore'". The band are featured on the cover of My Brain Hurts, Liz Baillie's comic about queer teenagers in New York City.
Phranc, is an American singer-songwriter whose career began playing in several bands in the late 1970s Los Angeles punk rock scene. Her musical style later shifted during the 1980s as a solo artist, into a self-proclaimed "All-American Jewish lesbian folksinger."
Team Dresch is an American punk rock band originally formed in 1993 in Olympia, Washington.
Shannon Bruce Snaith, better known as Shane West, is an American actor, singer and songwriter. He is known for his portrayal of Eli Sammler in the ABC family drama Once and Again, Landon Carter in A Walk to Remember, Dr. Ray Barnett in the NBC medical drama ER, Michael Bishop in The CW spy drama Nikita and in the WGN fantasy adventure historical drama Salem as John Alden. West received critical acclaim for his performance portraying Darby Crash in the biopic What We Do Is Secret.
Scott Treleaven is a Canadian artist whose work employs a variety of media including painting, collage, film, video, drawing, photography and installation.
The Tribeca Festival is an annual film festival organized by Tribeca Productions. It takes place each spring in New York City, showcasing a diverse selection of film, episodic, talks, music, games, art, and immersive programming. The festival was founded by Robert De Niro, Jane Rosenthal, and Craig Hatkoff in 2002 to spur the economic and cultural revitalization of Lower Manhattan following the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center. Until 2020, the festival was known as the Tribeca Film Festival.
Eugene Hütz is a Ukrainian-born singer, composer, disc jockey and actor, most notable as the frontman of the Gypsy punk band Gogol Bordello.
Jon Latimer Ginoli is an American guitarist and singer-songwriter. He is best known as a member of Pansy Division, a band that was founded by Ginoli and Chris Freeman in 1991. He is openly gay. Pansy Division is known as one of the founding examples of the queercore genre of punk rock, and has released seven studio albums, first on Lookout Records and later on Alternative Tentacles.
William Michael Albert Broad, known professionally as Billy Idol, is an English punk singer, songwriter, musician and actor. He achieved fame in the 1970s emerging from the London punk rock scene as the lead singer of the group Generation X. Subsequently, he embarked on a solo career which led to international recognition and made Idol a lead artist during the MTV-driven "Second British Invasion" in the US.
Riot grrrl is an underground feminist punk movement that began during the early 1990s within the United States in Olympia, Washington, and the greater Pacific Northwest, and has expanded to at least 26 other countries. A subcultural movement that combines feminism, punk music, and politics, it is often associated with third-wave feminism, which is sometimes seen as having grown out of the riot grrrl movement and has recently been seen in fourth-wave feminist punk music that rose in the 2010s. The genre has also been described as coming out of indie rock, with the punk scene serving as an inspiration for a movement in which women could express anger, rage, and frustration, emotions considered socially acceptable for male songwriters but less commonly for women.
Josh Braun is an American businessperson, film producer, musician and comics publisher known for his work in the bands Circus Mort and The Del-Byzanteens, for his formation in the companies Submarine Entertainment, and New Comic Co., the latter of which is responsible for republishing the horror comics Creepy and Eerie.
Kill Your Idols is a documentary film about three decades of art punk bands in New York City, directed and produced by Scott Crary and executive produced by Dan Braun and Josh Braun. The film debuted at the 2004 Tribeca Film Festival, where it won the award for Best Documentary.
Queercore: How to Punk a Revolution is a 2017 English-language German documentary film directed by Yony Leyser about the social and cultural movement known as Queercore. The documentary focuses on the movement's diverse elements, including zine culture, music, film, and activism.
Yony Leyser is a director and writer based in Berlin.
