EDITOR’S NOTE: In honor of the re-activated Replacements playing the Festival Pier on Saturday, we’re re-running Mats Week. Look for Replacements lore and legend all week on a Phawker near you!
Gorman Bechard, director of Color Me Obsessed, the recent documentary about the Replacements, may actually be the most obsessed Mats fan. “I personally feel they are the greatest rock ‘n’ roll band of all time, bar none,” he has said in an interview. “They are Gods to me. They are what I believe in.” Subtitled “the potentially true story of the last best band,” Color Me Obsessed is over two hours of fans, friends, critics, hangers-on, musicians, label guys, managers, producers, roadies, and wives passionately discussing the band’s history and its impact on their lives. Indie rock celebs like Grant Hart, Colin Meloy, and Craig Finn make appearances. Actor George Wendt even discusses his devotion as a fan. Color Me Obsessed is as much about how the Replacements affected their fans as it is about the band itself. Oddly, it has no live footage of the band and no interviews with any of the band members. Director Gorman Bechard says this is intentional. “I started thinking, what if I do a music doc where you never see or hear the band? And I started falling in love with that idea because it’s a crazy idea. That made me want to do it all the more. Here’s a band that bucked tradition and spit in the face of success at every turn. In a time when music videos could make a band’s career, they shot a video of a speaker. What’s more fitting than shooting a documentary about them where you never see them? They obviously didn’t want to be on camera. In a way, I’m honoring their wishes.” — MIKE WALSH
THE REPLACEMENTS + SUPERCHUNK PLAY THE FESTIVAL PIER ON MAY 9TH