Hired Gun: Out of the Shadows, into the Spotlight

Very well done. Great story telling. Harsh at times. Funny at others. A sincere and effective piece of film making. The Liberty DeVito story was particularly impacting.Proof positive that musicians are the greatest givers, for the most committed ones will endure anything to leave behind their creative stamp on the world. Sometimes the world notices. Sometimes it doesn't. But like Szarso said, "It's the journey that matters."Another reviewer sat in judgement condemning a musician's lifestyle. The one thing that reviewer failed to consider, because they're clearly not creative people who live from their art, is the fact that artists cannot live without the creative process. Without money, they can manage. But without exercising their creative powers, they cannot. It's walking death to an artist to not be able to produce output.They ultimately don't care about material things. To clarify, they do, but won't change the fact that they need to create output. If it pays the bills great! If it doesn't, it won't stop them. Even if it means sleeping on a floor in a basement with nothing but a sheet, they will still produce art that moves people's soul.Or die trying.Because they are able to value their lives in much loftier terms than the car you drive, the money you can spend, what you can show off, they are also able to regularly display more courage in the pursuit of their dreams than the guy who made enough money to buy the Ferrari. Every musician featured in this film is courageous to the bone. Brad Gillis having to learn Randy Rhoads solos in 4 days when Randy Rhoads had virtually just invented a new style? Abandoning Alice Cooper to play for an unknown band? To not turn bitter even after you're betrayed by someone you thought of as a brother for 30 years, like Liberty Devito?Look at what Liberty is doing with his music programs for kids in underprivileged neighborhoods now. That is priceless. That is a sign of a good person. A sign of true character.No. No one should dare sit in judgement of these people. It's wrong.That coveted Ferrari offers no path to immortality. A poem can. A song can.Artists don't conceive life on your materialistic terms. To judge them by those terms therefore, is senseless and ungrateful.No matter how an artist's life ends, we can always say something you cannot: I am part of recorded history. I have records. I have pieces. I have music that people hear and can change their mood. Accompany them through their sadness. Send a message. Smash boundaries. Help them solve a problem. See something from a different perspective. Start a revolution.I'd urge you to consider being grateful and not making these indictments on artists' lifestyle. After all, like Robin Williams said, "Banking, Real Estate, Finance, these are all noble pursuits. But music, art, poetry, those are the things that we live for.".

Cool film! I'm a lifelong musician myself, who's been happy to dwell in the underground, but always striving for greatness. The opportunity to play with pro level players has happened to me recently and it's a nice validation, and as Rudy Sarzo says, a blessing, for sure. Keep working on your skills and bettering yourself, then if an opportunity arises you'll be in a good position to pull it off. There's some good lessons and reminders in this for musicians like myself. Maybe a bit of an eye opener for people who don't know much about the industry. Some of these stories about leaders who don't take care of their people makes me sick.

I greatly appreciate Alice Cooper for creating this video because it shows the reality of what might appear to some young people to be an attractive career and way of life, but on a realistic evaluation, its one of the worst choices a young person could make. Music is great, everyone loves music, but it is a very crowded field, careers are unstable, unpredictable, and as this video shows, even the best players face life long discouraging setbacks no matter how good of a player they are. Even the best have extreme highs and lows, and the lows and setbacks are going to come inevitably. If you love music, great, make it your hobby, but find a decent way to earn a living that will be predictable so that you have that asset for the long run, so you can earn a living, raise a family, and evolve that career as technology and society evolves. But watch this film, these character are drawn in by the apparent glamour, the remote possibility of fame and fortune, only for most of them to find that outside of the opportunity to play music for an audience, the life style, is a dead end life style. This video shows how some, perhaps many in the business, will callously rip you off and treat you like dirt, and this includes some of the biggest names, most successful, and the business managers and their companies as well will rip of the unwary. Another point I have to make, these people think they are cool with the hair styles, dress, tattoos, jewelry, crude trash talk, and my feedback is that all this just shows how shallow and degraded they have made yourselves, being crude, uneducated, and being a perpetual adolescent is nothing to admire. Another point, this music is trash, shredding is noise, its not a musical skill.

If you are into music documentaries you owe it to yourself to watch Hired Gun. This documentary exposes the hidden world/ talents of the elusive session musician. My mentor in music theory, who is himself an amazing player/ musician told me in the very beginning that if you want to be an awesome, all-around musician you should strive to be a session guy. That is where the true talent lies in the music industry, no offense meant to the truly good artists out there, but these session musicians have to be able to change music and playing styles on the fly (depending on who their client is at any given time) not to mention that some of the time these guys don't have the luxury of rehearsal/ practice before getting called into the studio. They're just told "oh, we need a guitar solo here, a drum fill here," etc. and then have to make it happen or the producer will just call the next session guy on the list. How many of you could do that? I know I sure can't and I consider myself to be a pretty ok player. Now I just need to figure out how to play like the session musicians of the world.

A

A good look at the men and women in the pop music business (mostly on the metal side). This is also a good match with the documentary "Twenty Feet From Stardom" which looks at the back ground singers in the pop music business. Two great documentaries to see for any music student at college level who is considering going into pop music and / or touring. Without dissuading anyone from going in this direction, these documentaries may clear some foggy vision while still maintaining the joy of making music.It's good to see that both documentaries emphasize the business end of pop music and that individual success depends on many things including a dedicated, great deal of practice, the ability to get along well with people and the ability to network plus the need to stay as healthy and as clear headed as possible in difficult situations.

If you love music, you must see this film! The high calibre musicians featured in this documentary are the people that make the "stars" sound as awesome as they do. Having Nita Strauss a part of this film was especially awesome because she is an absolutely phenomenal guitarist. I also loved the sad but true part of the industry that is discussed - once some of these "stars" are done with you, you become a stranger to them. This was especially evident in Liberty Devitto's case. Magnificent look at the music industry.

und auch der Sound...meine Güte! Aber: Alles in englischer Sprache und es wird echt schnell gesprochen. Wer in Englisch nicht so fit ist, der könnte an einigen Stellen ein Verständnisproblem bekommen.

Learned a few things from some players that have been around. I 'd love to see another one Hired GUNS part 2 ?