Hello, big screen, hello! YUNGBLUD weaves glossy black-and-white vignettes and a tale of self-reckoning through the first live performances of the songs from Idols…
YUNGBLUD is currently knee deep in his most pivotal chapter so far. The paint is still drying in his fourth album, Idols, equal parts a course correction, a reassertion of his own identity, and a statement of his ambition. The ground had already been paved for this feature-length documentary, where ahead of Idols’ release, Dom Harrison and his band decamped to Berlin to perform for the first time songs the world has not yet heard. Directed by award-winning filmmaker Paul Dugdale, what unfolds is both a track-by-track performance, with detailed yet profoundly unfiltered commentary weaving those songs together.
Dom tells his story in intimate fragments – in a car, sat on a hotel bed, in a café – intercut with live renditions of every song from Idols. It’s an exercise in self-reckoning, of his position in the world, of the flux in his identity as he enters his late twenties, and his reconciliation with himself after becoming consumed with what thousands of people behind screens thought of him.
Collaborator Matt Schwarz even admits that “he hasn’t always been authentic, but he is being authentic now.” Though Dom says he doesn’t regret a second of 2022’s fractured, wobbly self-titled album, he does admit: “I’ve repeated myself. I compromised. I felt compromised.” Idols is where his undistilled essence lies, a long-standing project with its roots dating back to early 2021 that was shelved when his label said they didn’t get it.
There’s the sense that, in making this, Dom wants to stand on the shoulders of giants, but without looking down at the legendary names – Jagger, Bowie, the lot – who are holding him up. He wants to be his own thing, but with the grandiosity of an old-fashioned capital-R rock star. The film is mostly shot in a classy black-and-white, but the colour segments have an aged appearance, as if the film is being thought about as an archival document to be pored over by fans decades into the future. He’s full of big, profound statements throughout.
“Complacency is the biggest killer for any artist,” he says at one point. It’s about real emotion, he tells us. These scenes are meant to be art. This film wants to be thought of as art.
That said, the film is at its best when it isn’t trying so hard. The most beautiful parts are when he’s not thinking, and just feeling. Sometimes, that’s when he’s just goofing around, such as the endearing moment when he attempts to slide down a banister. Other times, it gets raw. We see Dom lashing out at himself when he’s suddenly unable to hit the high notes in The Greatest Parade. In a scene with an entirely black screen, Dom throws objects about, cursing himself, spiraling further. “What the fuck is wrong with me?” he yells. “I’m better than I’m giving you.”
Later, he gets almost unduly cross with his band when he believes they’ve made some music sound too much like pop. The greatest gut-punch, however, arrives when he discusses stepping away temporarily from his relationship with the love of his life, Jesse Jo Stark. “Now I’m here, what I want is her,” he confesses. “I love her.” The segue into Ghosts that follows weighs even heavier as a result.
There’s a duality to this portrait of YUNGBLUD – there’s the polished, eloquent rock star whose mind runs a thousand miles a minute. Then, there’s Dom, who feels as much as he thinks. It’s a well-rounded, elegantly realised picture. Beneath, especially in the performances, there’s a feelgood factor too. Asked at the end if the resounding feeling he has is pressure or freedom, he grins and declares: “Complete, unadulterated freedom. It’s fucking awesome.”
Verdict: 4/5
YUNGBLUD. ARE YOU READY, BOY? comes to cinemas on August 20 and 24.
Get your limited-edition Kerrang! x YUNGBLUD zine.
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