With a streak of humility utterly foreign to most music documentaries, Dunstan Bruce recounts the band’s successes – and failures – as pop stars and political activists
Photograph: Music Film Network undefinedPhotograph: Music Film Network undefineds a Dr Martens-wearing teenager in the 90s, I loathed the anarchist indie band Chumbawamba and their chart-topping anthem Tubthumping. Well, I take it all back after watching this funny and surprisingly sweet documentary co-directed by frontman Dunstan Bruce and Sophie Robinson.
But from here the film settles nicely into an enjoyable blast of pop history. Chumbawamba started out as an anarchist collective in Leeds in 1982: living together in a squat, they went vegan , shared money equally and took it in turns to do the cooking. They’d been going for years when Tubthumping topped the charts. With a worldwide smash hit on their hands, the band decided that here was an opportunity to do something positive – to be a political band inside the belly of popular culture.
Chumbawamba were massive in America, and did the talkshow circuit. In the present day, Bruce interviews their big time American record label boss from that period, who says none of it changed a thing. No one was listening to the political message. “It went largely over everyone’s head.” That’s what’s so unusual about I Get Knocked Down: it has a streak of humility utterly foreign to most music documentaries. Bruce puts in the bits every other band on the planet would leave out.
Chumbawamba split up in 2012. They’re still mates and come across here as extremely likable, not taking themselves at all too seriously. Scenes of them nattering together, having a giggle now, are lovely. So too are the end credits featuring clips from YouTube of ordinary people singing Tubthumping – everyone finding power and defiance in the song, from Christian choirs to heavy metal bands and small kids.
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