For me, I don’t think I’ve ever been as excited to see a movie in my life as I am for Electric Apricot: Quest for Festeroo. Les Claypool’s mockumentary on the jamband scene is sure to make everyone laugh, and Les has been doing a great job of clueing in everybody on the subject. Check out Andy Tennille’s latest Smell the Glove podcast for some audio commentary to supplement the article below.
the movie pokes fun at the jam band scene that has embraced Claypool of late, and features cameos from Phish’s Mike Gordon, the Dead’s Bob Weir, Warren Haynes, actor Seth Green and “South Park” co-creator Matt Stone.
“The whole notion is, this band has been kicking around Northern California for a good number of years, and they finally get a couple of big breaks,” Claypool says. “One of them is the chance to put out a record, and other is that they get booked for the Holy Grail of jam band festivals, which is Festeroo.”
And while “Electric Apricot” has been well-received at such film festivals as Oregon’s Longbaugh and California’s Tiburon (where it won best comedy), the production was fraught with adversity.
“It was the most difficult undertaking I’ve ever been involved in in my life,” Claypool insists. “We had a couple of trips to the hospital. We had a hit-and-run. We had a guy who went crazy and threatened to throw all the footage into a fire. I had friends and managers fighting with each other. Then, we’re on our way to the festival we’re supposed to be filming for the main shot of the picture, and it gets canceled 45 minutes before we get there in an RV!”
Claypool recognizes comparisons to the legendary mockumentary “This Is Spinal Tap” are inevitable, but he notes, “Ours is way less overt. It’s actually more influenced by the Ricky Gervais stuff, like ‘The Office.’ It’s extraordinarily dry. Some people have thought it’s a real documentary.”
Claypool is negotiating for a distribution deal to bring the film to a wider audience. “There have been some offers for straight to DVD, but we really want to do an art house theatrical release,” he says.
Awesome. I want Live Music Blog to host the Chicago showing. It’s on my to-do list.