If you played six degrees of separation with all the important art-rock bands of the 1960s, ‘70s, and beyond—David Bowie, Lou Reed, Nico, John Cale, and The Velvet Underground, David Byrne and Talking Heads, Iggy Pop & The Stooges, Roxy Music, Devo and more—all roads lead to Brian Eno, easily one of the most important music producers and experimental musicians of all time that basically singlehandedly started the ambient music movement. Eno also helped U2 and Coldplay achieve their greatest pop heights in the ’90s, 2000s, and 2010s, and he is an absolutely towering figure in music (not for nothing, his first four records recorded between 1974 and 1977 are all art pop masterpieces).
Well, it’s very overdue, but Eno is finally getting his own proper documentary. Acclaimed filmmaker Gary Hustwit (“Helvetica,” “Objectified”) announced this week that he has started working on “Eno,”, the first authorized career-spanning documentary about the visionary musician, artist, and creative intellectual.
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Rich with access to hundreds of hours of never-before-seen footage, unreleased music from Eno’s archive, and visual art, “Eno” will be released in multiple versions and will employ groundbreaking generative technology in its creation and exhibition. Hustwit’s collaboration with Eno first began in 2017, when the musician created an original score for Hustwit’s “Rams,” about the German designer Dieter Rams. The film is being produced by Brooklyn-based production company Film First, with worldwide sales handled by Submarine. “Eno” is expected to be released in 2023.
Hustwit is no stranger to music world documentaries. He served as a producer on critically acclaimed music docs like “I Am Trying To Break Your Heart: A Film About Wilco” by Sam Jones and “Mavis!” about Mavis Staples directed by doc filmmaker Jessica Edwards.
Here’s a good synopsis of Eno’s music career as a producer, musician, “legendary sonic landscaper” and the man who created the iconic 1995 Windows start-up sound.
For the past 50 years Brian Eno has been at the forefront of musical creativity, technology, and artistic innovation. The hugely influential British musician, producer, activist, visual artist and self-described “sonic landscaper” began his career as an original member of the legendary Roxy Music in the early 1970s. He left the band to release a series of solo records and later pioneered the genre of ambient music with his 1978 album Ambient 1: Music for Airports. As a producer, Brian Eno has helped define and reinvent the sound of some of the most important artists in music, including David Bowie, U2, Talking Heads, Coldplay, and dozens of others. He also composed what may be the most heard piece of music in the world: the startup sound for Microsoft Windows. Undeniably, Eno has changed the way modern music is made.
Befitting its subject, “Eno” will utilize proprietary generative software developed by Hustwit and digital artist Brendan Dawes to provide unique viewing experiences via multiple digital formats, cinema screenings and site-specific installations. “You can’t make a conventional, by-the-numbers bio doc about Brian Eno,” said Hustwit. “That would be antithetical and a missed opportunity. What I’m trying to do is to create a cinematic experience that’s as innovative as Brian’s approach to music and art.”
“Much of Brian’s career has been about enabling creativity in himself and others, through his role as a producer but also through his collaborations on projects like the Oblique Strategies cards or the music app Bloom,” he continued. “I think of ENO as an art film about creativity, with the output of Brian’s 50-year career as its raw material.”
Eno produced some of the most important rock albums of all time, including David Bowie’s Berlin Trilogy, the Talking Heads’ afrobeat-flecked ’70s records, the David Byrne collaboration My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts, John Cale’s Fear, and their 1990 collaboration Wrong Way Up, Devo’s Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo!, and many more.
Following Edgar Wright’s Sparks documentary “The Sparks Brothers” and Todd Haynes’ “Velvet Underground” doc, we’re currently in a golden era of definitive documentaries on some of the most seminal bands of all time.