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Business Journals
09-07-2025
- Business
- Business Journals
8850 Sunset project moves forward after facing foreclosure
Story Highlights Silver Creek Development secures $71 million loan for 8850 Sunset project. Project includes residences, hotel, retail, and redeveloped Viper Room nightclub. Loan will fund design and permitting for West Hollywood development. Two months after facing foreclosure, the developers behind a mixed-use project on Los Angeles' Sunset Strip have received $71 million in fresh financing. Silver Creek Development is moving forward with 8850 Sunset after the firm defaulted on a loan for the project, WeHo Online first reported in May. In 2022, Cottonwood Group had provided the $62 million loan for 8850 Sunset Blvd. in West Hollywood. GET TO KNOW YOUR CITY Find Local Events Near You Connect with a community of local professionals. Explore All Events Now, the developers have secured a new predevelopment loan from Centennial Bank and Crestline Investors. The project will redevelop a strip of retail in West Hollywood into residences, a 90-key boutique hotel, high-street retail, restaurants and both public and private amenities, including a rooftop pool and event space. On the ground floor, next to the retail and restaurants, the Viper Room nightclub will be razed and redeveloped as an enhanced venue and recording studio with a memorabilia exhibit space. For the housing portion, Silver Creek plans to bring 62 market rate units and 16 restricted-income units to the Strip, according to the project's website. Charles Essig, managing director of Silver Creek Development, said in a statement that the firm is 'eager to proceed with the future development' of the project and the repositioning of the Viper Room. Newmark arranged the predevelopment loan on behalf of Silver Creek, with the firm's Jonathan Firestone and Blake Thompson securing the financing. The loan will be used for design and permitting costs. A start date for construction has yet to be announced. The architect is Miami-based Arquitectonica. Sign up for Business First's free daily newsletter to receive the latest business news impacting Los Angeles.
Forbes
07-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
Sunday Conversation: Linkin Park Open Up On Friendship, Music And More
MONTERREY, MEXICO - FEBRUARY 5: performs during a concert as part of the 'From Zero World Tour' at ... More Estadio Banorte on February 5, 2025 in Monterrey, Mexico. (Photo by Medios) Back in 2004 I went on the road with Linkin Park to do a coffee table book, From The Inside: Linkin Park's Meteora. I became friends with all the band members, but over time I became closest with Chester Bennington as he spent time in Long Beach, California, where I lived at the time. Fast forward to 2012, when I get invited down to the Viper Room to see L.A. breakout rock band Dead Sara. I did their first major story, for Rolling Stone, and became good friends with frontwoman Emily Armstrong. So, when Armstrong was announced in 2024 as the new lead singer of Linkin Park, I definitely understood fans' conflicted emotions. However, whatever you felt as a fan or associate or anything, only Brad Delson, Joe Hahn, Dave Farrell, Mike Shinoda and former drummer Rob Bourdon had a right to decide the band's future. As someone who has, by this point, interviewed as many bands as anyone in the world, I have seen what losing a band mate does to someone. I will never forget sitting with Who frontman Roger Daltrey at the legendary Sunset Marquis in L.A. and asking him if he ever went into the Morrison Hotel Gallery in the front of the hotel. His response: 'No, because all I see are pictures of dead friends.' I just did a piece for The L.A. Times on the sixtieth anniversary of The Doors. More than 50 years later, John Densmore and Robby Krieger are still impacted by the loss of Jim Morrison. Losing a band mate is like losing a brother or a sister, someone you traveled with, created with, fought with, loved, and one of the only people who experienced the highs and lows with you. It is a loss that requires grieving and as anyone who has suffered loss knows, there is no right way to grieve. It is up to you to decide. So, as someone who still considers LP friends I am thrilled to see their new chapter because it is their right. Now with Armstrong and new drummer Colin Brittain, as well as touring guitarist Alex Feder, the band is conducting a huge worldwide tour at the moment behind the From Zero record. I spoke with Delson and Farrell in in-depth separate conversations over two days. It was great to catch up with two old friends to look at this new chapter of Linkin Park. Steve Baltin: Not touring with them, does it allow you the freedom to do stuff that you would not otherwise do? Brad Delson: I don't look at it that way. I look at it as really focusing on the aspects of the band that are the most energizing for me, which in this chapter really is the creative stuff, the stuff in the studio, even like the show itself, like the conceptual design behind the show, which I worked on. That, to me, is the most fun thing to do in this moment. And so I think Steve, one of the benefits of having taken time off from making new stuff is we all gained the ability to look at the creative opportunity of the band with fresh eyes and not just do things because we've done them in the past but really opting into what is fun and what we love. That's kind of an ethos for the whole band. And I think actually that's one of the reasons we've worked together so well in this chapter together and we've had success creatively together, is that openness. Maybe some of it is maturity, and just the experience of having done things a certain way and now having the gift of being able to approach things with a new perspective. Baltin: I hadn't thought about this, but unfortunately you reach a certain age we've all gone through way too much loss and it gives you a lot of perspective. During that time when you're thinking about stuff does it also let you gain perspective on what you want and what you don't want? Delson: I think one of the benefits of experience is just having more self-awareness of what you know, what makes us tick, what fills our cup, what gives us energy, how we can be most contributive. As humans when we're happy, it's easier to fill someone else's cup. So, for me, yeah, just moving toward what feels energizing and we're really excited about this chapter, just the way it's all come together. The album, for me, the most important things are the relationships and then the art. The album itself we've always been hyper intentional as you know about anything we put out including an incredible coffee table book that a very prominent prestigious writer helped us create back in the day. We never want to put out anything that we don't put all our love and care into and really believe in and this album is no exception. Even the fact that there's only 10 songs on the album, there was a lot of music written and creative exploration. So, whittling it down to its most essential parts was really a privilege. And even with the deluxe, there are only three new songs on the deluxe and each of them felt like an important song to share for different reasons. We take our contract with our fan base really seriously and we want to share stuff that we believe in and that we love. That's served us well in the past and that's something I love participating in. Baltin: Has stepping back from the road reinvigorated you? Delson: Yeah, super energized. Then when other creative stuff comes up behind the scenes, I'm fresh I can be helpful. Our whole ecosystem is really, as you know, quite elaborate. The band is creatively prolific and ambitious, and we love making things and sharing things with our supporters, whether it's the zine that we're putting out, the LPU, the tour and the production of the tour, the merch, little popups that we've been doing, or it's stuff online. We just like putting care into it and a lot goes into all of it. So, it's been fun to focus on some of that stuff. Just being creative, working on song ideas and supporting everything that's going on. Yeah, very privileged to be a part of it all, very stoked and really grateful that our fan base continues to evolve and has embraced this new chapter with so much passion. That's ultimately the dream of any artist is to share what they love with other people and then get some kind of connection back. You look at 'The Emptiness Machine' for example, that exceeded everyone's wildest imagination. When that happens it's not something we take for granted. The band is focused on playing great shows, making great music and being really intentional about what we're able to do as musicians and as artists. Baltin: I talked about this with Gerard Way and there is no way to predict this, but it seems like for certain bands the absence just builds the legacy. And it seems like for you guys as well, there's been that hunger of people who miss you. Then there's a new generation who didn't get to experience it. Delson: Yeah, when we put out "Lost," which was the song that we held off of Meteora -- I remember it was with Andy Wallace in New York, and we intentionally held that one off. Then to release it over 20 years later and it was number one that year, it signaled to us yeah, that there really is a very hungry appetite for the music. It's really cool to see shows, I've been hearing feedback of fans that have supported the band since our early history, standing next to people who are seeing Linkin Park for the first time. When I started playing guitar my favorite band was Led Zeppelin. I had the whole songbook and I tried to learn all the songs and 14-year-olds today learning guitar, I've heard that our band is the one that they're learning all the songs from. That was always our goal, to make timeless music. It's an ambitious thing to say. It's a pretty surreal thing when that actually happens. There's also this really interesting juxtaposition of the early history having a recurring Impact on culture today and then the new stuff like right along with it. So, I think that's a really exciting thing about the show, you're getting these classic songs and then you've got 'Heavy Is The Crown' or 'Up From The Bottom' or 'Emptiness Machine' or whatever and those songs are brand new. So, it's like this weird pastiche of moments that emerge at different junctures throughout our career all coming together for this really amazing celebration that's moving around the world on stage in front of our fans. Baltin: Talk about working with Emily. Delson: I think what's amazing about her integration into our creative DNA is she's clearly her own ingredient. It's not Emily trying to be somebody else, it's just Emily being herself. That's what really stuck out to me. Even when we were hanging out at East West, just her presence, her energy, even without her singing, something about her energy felt right to me. It felt like a natural fit. Baltin: I talked to Brad yesterday and he and I talked about the fact that during the unexpected hiatus, each of you got some chance to decide what you did and didn't miss. What did you miss? Dave Farrell: Yeah, I think it was definitely something I'd missed. Music, for me, has been a big part of my life since I was really little. I was still able to obviously enjoy so many of the different aspects of that that I've always loved. I could still listen to music, I could still go to shows with my wife and kids, still experience that connection that I've always loved and had with it, but I definitely missed not being able to play and share that experience and feeling with fans and with the crowd. And I think, yes, definitely there was a chance to zoom out a little bit and look at what we had done and how we had done it and say, 'This aspect I loved, this aspect of it I'd like to change.' And watch the whole process with that new framework. Baltin: As he and I talked about yesterday as well, unfortunately loss is one of those things that shapes you immensely. So, while you never planned on the break, it's one of those things that during that time off you're going to readjust everything. Farrell: Yeah, 100 percent. You don't get to choose if you're going to suffer or not in life. You're going to suffer, but you do get to choose how you try to navigate it and you do get to choose what you do with it and how you try to move forward. This was putting that mentality to the test for me and just taking the punches and then kind of saying, 'Okay, how do we move forward from here? What feels good? What doesn't? Where do you go?' A big part of that process too was even taking a first step when it came to the band. I was pretty paralyzed early on with the mentality that I needed to figure out everything before I even was able to take a step. Questions like, 'Are we going to do a new album? Are we just going to do a new single? Then if we do play shows, are we going to play old stuff? Or is it just going to be new stuff? And then what's the band going to look like?' Then at a certain point I was like, 'I can create these crazy questions to try to figure out, or I could just get in a room with Mike and Joe and make stuff and see if we even like it. Let's just take a step and then see what the next step may or may not be.' It was so freeing when I finally got to that space because it just took so much pressure off of the whole thing that is Linkin Park. It's like, 'Let's pursue what we enjoy about this and let's not have any preconceived ideas of where it's going or what it needs to be, but let's just see if we even like it.' There was a moment when I didn't know if we would still write music that I liked as weird as that might sound to some people. A lot of stuff that you do, sometimes you get it to a place and you're like, "This isn't working for me. I'm not connecting with it.' Similarly, I didn't know if I would want to go out and play the old songs. I didn't know what that might feel like, I didn't know if it would hurt too much. So, it was just a process of, let's just take each little step and see what that opens up for the next step, and then fast forward. Here we are. Baltin: Did you find when you started writing with Mike and Joe, was it something like excuse the cliché, of riding a bicycle? Farrell: No, it was more for a period of months, I would say, we'd have time scheduled to be together, where for eight hours it was just eat lunch, talk about a bunch of stuff, talk about what we might do, talk about what that is then, we're going to eat dinner and then it's like, 'Let's just mess around on some guitar riffs and then okay cool, see you tomorrow.' We did versions of that in different ways for a long time and even in the early phases of it, it was like this is a great excuse just for us to get together and be friends and hang out and have a scheduled reason for that. We didn't know what we were doing, or if it was even going to be Linkin Park. We didn't know if it would feel like that or fit for that. And even when we started bringing in other people to write with and to play with, we were very intentional about telling them, we're just getting together to work on music and enjoy it and have fun. But this is not Linkin Park. That's not what we are writing for or that's not what we're working on exactly. So even super early in the process with Colin first and then with Emily it was just an opportunity for us to get together and hang out with people, write music, play music and eventually those two were not only extremely talented but just so fun to be around and so enjoyable to spend time with it just grew into a thing. I don't know what that is or where that goes. We don't know, but we want to now pour more time, energy, effort into whatever this group is and see what this can do. Baltin: It's not something I had thought of, but the idea of you guys just reconnecting as friends is interesting because when you go through a tragedy, it's natural to pull away. Farrell: At least for me, I have different groups of friends that I do different things with. Some of my friends are friends that my wife and I go out to dinner with. Some of my friends are friends that I play golf with or are interested in soccer or whatever, friends that I grew up with. Linkin Park is a group of my closest friends, but what we do together is play and make music. When we're on periods of time when we're not playing or making music, we're still close, but we don't have that same connection or reason that's pulling us together. With Chester passing, we lost Chester, but we also lost this thing that we get to do together. So, a part of the journey of the whole thing has been us saying, 'What do we do now? When we get together, what does that look like? How does that work? What's our new relationship going to be? Are we still doing music together? We're obviously still friends and have shared so much life experience together that we're going to be friends and we're going to be in each other's lives if we're not doing music but it's different. That relationship has changed if we're no longer doing music together.' But rediscovering that initially with Mike and Joe and then adding Brad into the mix down the road that was like a new pathway to having these relationships that are just so special and awesome for me. And having it then work in a scale with the fans that's the icing on the cake. Or that's the cherry on the sundae for me is that it came together and people have enjoyed it.
Time Business News
02-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Business News
Suing the "Accidental Fixer" in Hollywood to Move Exploitation
In a world where public safety and humanitarian work intersect with the entertainment industry, our shared mission to help vulnerable individuals can become an extraordinary test of resilience and determination. Following in her mother Victoria's footsteps in the Arts, where Victoria had worked in publicity for musicians, Christina Taft committed her professional life to supporting people in the arts and improving rescue services, despite the 'Accidental Fixer' in Hollywood. Beginning around 2022, this positive change brought her into contact with Paul Barresi, an individual with a documented history of targeting vulnerable people in the entertainment industry who later published a 2024 book called Johnny Depp's Accidental Fixer . People caught in the middle were leveraged against their interests, with both sides suffering emotionally and financially. What started as Taft's efforts to support assault victims and witnesses, including her friend Angela—a talented music artist and model who had suffered trauma from assaults and coordinated retaliation from Marton Csokas and his associates—as witnessed by several individuals, soon escalated into a years-long campaign that would test Taft's resolve and resilience. Angela and Taft had both influenced positive publicity, with Angela dedicating a tribute song to support Johnny, and Taft had supported Amber's humanitarian work, where then Barresi exploited these vulnerabilities to his commercial advantage with unconsented recordings and negative publicity campaigns. The campaign created significant challenges across multiple areas of Taft's life. Unauthorized recordings of private phone conversations were distributed without consent, and persistent harassment accompanied across state lines, disrupting her business operations and professional relationships. Adam Waldman was unconsentedly recorded with Barresi linking frightening harassment of 'Johnny witnesses' and vandalism, break-ins. The targeting extended beyond Taft herself to include family members and associates, creating intimidation that affected everyone in her circle. Negative publicity and manipulated narratives were used to invade privacy and safety and isolate individuals from their support networks. This situation impacts multiple sides of disputes, where resolution is needed to overcome negative freelancing, stalking, invading privacy and use of publicists. The exploitation of private communications and manipulation of information affects all parties involved, regardless of their perspectives or affiliations, creating a harmful environment that damages everyone and requires systemic solutions to address these destructive practices. Among the serious issues uncovered was evidence of financial misconduct related to the Anthony Fox matters—the case of the missing Viper Room co-owner. Taft's investigation revealed concerning patterns that Barresi continually gained commercially from exploiting and worsening these unresolved circumstances by activities creating chaos between witnesses, victims, and involved parties. The impact on others was profound and far-reaching. Angela's promising music career was severely disrupted, and various witnesses reported feeling intimidated about coming forward with their experiences. Victims were lost in the agendas. Negative publicity campaigns created a climate of fear that affected not just the primary targets but an entire network of individuals connected to the entertainment industry and survivor support work. Financial consequences were substantial, with Taft's companies suffering significant damages including the dissolution of international partnerships. Her public safety platform, Worldie Ltd, lost ten major international partnerships, and potential grants for her SaveMeNow initiative worth between $100,000 and $10,000,000 were disrupted. Throughout these challenges, Taft demonstrated remarkable determination in her response. She continued advocating for survivor safety and rights, filed formal complaints with appropriate authorities, and sought legal protection through the courts. When necessary for her safety, she relocated while trying to subsist her commitment to public safety work, showing that geographic boundaries wouldn't stop her humanitarian efforts. The current legal proceedings represent hope for justice and protection. Taft has successfully obtained a temporary restraining order and is pursuing comprehensive legal remedies to protect herself and others from further harassment. The legal system is now actively engaged in addressing these issues, providing a framework for accountability and protection. Most importantly, this case represents something larger than individual grievances—it's about someone standing up against intimidation tactics and fighting for the rights of vulnerable individuals. Taft's persistence in seeking justice through proper legal channels, while pivoting to work with interns from a Chicago partnership who help people related to the arts and cases despite personal risk and financial cost, demonstrates how individuals can maintain their principles and fight for others even when facing significant adversity. Ultimately, Taft seeks to find relief for her friend Angela and resolving disputes by pivoting upon discoveries back to unification and the underlying needs. Rather than perpetuating division, her approach focuses on addressing the root causes of harm and working toward solutions that serve everyone's legitimate interests, recognizing that healing requires moving beyond adversarial positions against types of abuse to find common ground and shared humanity. Through this work, Taft became dedicated to helping vulnerable individuals navigate trauma and recovery. The story continues with hope as the legal system works to establish proper protections for all parties involved. Taft's unwavering commitment to her mission of helping others, even in the face of sustained types of abuse, serves as an inspiring example of resilience and the power of standing up for what's right. Her work in public safety and survivor support continues, proving that dedication to helping others can survive even the most challenging circumstances. People can read more from the second amendment of case 5:24-cv-01930-TJH-DTB for additional details about this ongoing legal link: TIME BUSINESS NEWS
Telegraph
18-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Counting Crows' Adam Duritz: ‘I've known Springsteen for decades and I still can't speak around him'
It's not often – if ever – that an American pop song name checks The Telegraph. But now, we can add at least one track to that list, thanks to alt-rock veterans Counting Crows. Their latest single, Under the Aurora, opens with an image of London commuters grasping this very newspaper. 'Almost the entirety of our new record was written in England, which is why there's that reference,' explains Adam Duritz, the band's lead singer and principal songwriter. He's talking to me from his home in New York, ahead of the release of Counting Crows' new album, Butter Miracle, The Complete Sweets! Other nods to Britain are scattered across the album: one track references a 'shrinking English sky'; another sneaks in the British colloquialism of 'telly' for television. But while his recent stay in England clearly influenced the album, Duritz is a longtime Anglophile. 'I can't describe to you what a thrill it was that first time we went to London,' he says. 'As a kid, you see pictures of the Beatles coming to America and getting off the plane. Going to London for the first time was like that in reverse for me.' That first overseas tour came in the mid-1990s. Counting Crows had experienced a smash success with their debut album, August and Everything After. It seemed like a self-fulfilling prophecy. After all, the breakout single, Mr. Jones, was about an aspiring singer who dreamed of fame. 'When everybody loves you / You can never be lonely,' Duritz sang. But he soon found that celebrity had its drawbacks. 'It was a really hard adjustment,' Duritz recalls. 'I didn't know how to be famous. When I got home at the end of touring, there were kids camped out on my lawn – I mean literally!' To escape, he started working a menial job – albeit in an exclusive location. 'I bartended at the Viper Room for a while,' he says. Founded by Johnny Depp and his 21 Jump Street co-star Sal Jenco, the club became the infamous epicentre of 1990s Hollywood culture. 'I was among friends and I was comfortable,' Duritz tells me of his time at the Viper Room. 'I have been a really shy person my whole life. I had trouble going up to people and saying 'Hi'. But when I got famous, I didn't have to go up to people anymore. They came up to me.' Duritz found he was more comfortable being approached in that contained world than out in public. 'The Viper Room gave me a home at a time when I needed one,' he remembered in a 2021 documentary about the club. 'I will treasure Johnny Depp for the rest of my life because of that. It changed my life. It was the making of me in some ways – the remaking of me.' Duritz became a key figure in the venue's celebrity scene, where he met – and dated – a string of A-list actresses. 'I met Jennifer Aniston there because a bunch of my friends lied to me and told me she had a crush on me,' Duritz recalled in the documentary. 'I honestly had no idea who she was. I had been on the road during all of Friends.' He also dated Aniston's Friends co-star, Courteney Cox, who appeared in the music video for the Counting Crows song A Long December. After their debut, the band continued to find success – their second album went to Number 1, and they also picked up an Oscar nomination for their song Accidentally in Love, from Shrek 2. But that first album and single still seemed to overshadow everything else. A recent video promoting their tour acknowledges this with good humour. Duritz lies on an analyst's couch, while a therapist (played by Brain Fallon from New Jersey rock band The Gaslight Anthem) enquires: 'None of your other records have sold as well as your first one. How does that make you feel?' Duritz may be able to poke fun at the diminishing returns of his band's output. But it's still a sore point. In fact, it's a key reason why Counting Crows haven't released a full-length album in 11 years. 'I really loved our last record,' Duritz says, referring to 2014's Somewhere Under Wonderland. 'Our label did everything to promote it. And I felt like it still barely made any impression on the general public. After that, I got discouraged about the idea of doing really good work and then having it just disappear.' As Duritz acknowledges, the seismic changes that reshaped the music industry have put bands from an earlier era at risk of being left behind. 'I got the feeling we didn't know how to put records out in this new world,' he admits. 'Radio doesn't really do it any more. There's no MTV. I love social media and its possibilities. But I missed the boat on Instagram and TikTok.' Throughout our conversation, Duritz defaults to this kind of self-criticism. Rock stars are supposed to ooze confidence. But he seems more focused on his shortcomings – particularly his mental health struggles with dissociative disorder and social anxiety. 'I can be a complete frozen nightmare with my heroes,' he tells me. 'I've known Bruce Springsteen for 35 years and I still have trouble forming sentences around him.' This lack of confidence is another reason for the 11-year gap between albums. 'I sat on these new songs for two-and-a-half years without even playing them for the band,' Duritz says. 'It was hard for me to know if they were good. I really started doubting them and I lost a lot of confidence.' One is tempted to draw an analogy with the Biblical Sampson, whose powers were bound up in his hair. After all, this new album will be the band's first since Duritz shaved off his trademark dreadlocks. It was a haircut so significant that it made headlines around the world. It also sparked a social media storm among Counting Crows fans. Most were supportive, though some took the opportunity to mock Duritz's departed dreads, which had reportedly been reinforced by extensions. 'Where will the crows nest?' one commenter quipped. But whether the hair was real or fake, the Old Testament analogy is apt. Duritz admits that his new look has had a major impact on his identity and self-esteem. 'Since I cut the dreads off I've become much less recognisable,' he says. 'I've found myself struggling to talk to people again.' At a recent party, he found himself next to actors Michael McKean and Bob Odenkirk. 'Neither of them knew who I was,' Duritz says. When a partygoer outed him as 'the singer from Counting Crows', McKean joked, 'Let me shake your hand again now I know you're famous.' 'It was funny,' Duritz acknowledges. 'But I'm having this weird experience where I'm suddenly not famous. I'm having to do that thing I had to do when I was a kid which is introduce myself to everybody. But I'm still paralysingly shy.' However, the party ended with a more affirmative encounter, when Duritz was recognised by Jack Antonoff, superstar producer for Taylor Swift and frontman of indie band Bleachers. 'He was probably the only person there who actually knew who I was,' Duritz says. 'I said to him, 'Ever since I shaved my dreads, nobody recognises me.' Then he was like, 'It was never the dreads, man. It was always you.' He was really nice.' Duritz could have used such positive reinforcement two-and-a-half years earlier. Because when he did finally share his new songs with the band, he found his doubts had been misplaced. 'It just felt great. We ended up going in a couple weeks later to make the record.' Now, everything will come full circle, as the band's upcoming tour culminates with a final show in London – like the Beatles in reverse again. 'It's still the coolest thing coming to London,' Duritz says. 'It's still a thrill.' Beyond that, he has hopes for the future of Counting Crows, albeit in his usual self-deprecating way. 'I suppose at some point it's going to run out,' he reflects. 'No one's going to want to see us or we'll get sick or someone will die. But as long as we can play, we will. Because why not? I mean, who gets to spend a whole life playing rock'n'roll? It's pretty rare.'
The Independent
25-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
‘I get PTSD when I watch it': The inside story of Dig!, the most outrageous music documentary of all time
The year is 1996, and a psychedelic rock band with revolution in their ears and methamphetamine in their veins are in full flow at the Viper Room in Los Angeles. The Brian Jonestown Massacre, led by their mercurial, messianic frontman Anton Newcombe, believe they are on the verge of breaking big. A gaggle of music industry power players have been invited to bless their ascension, yet instead what they witness is a chaotic onstage brawl that culminates in smashed instruments and tattered dreams. Newcombe, ejected into the night by security, seethes: 'You f***ing broke my sitar, motherf***er!' This scene plays out early in Dig!, perhaps the most rock'n'roll documentary ever made. Ondi Timoner's 2004 film revolves around the contrasting fortunes of the Jonestown and their more industry-savvy friends and later rivals the Dandy Warhols. The camera travels from grimy bedsits to lavish video shoots and sold-out festival appearances, capturing the grit, the debauched determination and the righteous fervour required to believe your music really might change the world. The actor Jonah Hill has declared it to be a landmark work comparable to Goodfellas. Dave Grohl called it 'the most honest, warts-and-all description of what it's like when you and your friends join a band, jump in a van and try to start a revolution'. Twenty years on from its release, a new extended cut of the film, dubbed Dig! XX, is back in cinemas and set for digital release. The additional footage adds depth and context, including the backstory to Newcombe's oft-quoted sitar line. More than that, thanks to the additional perspective offered by the last two decades, the film now plays as a fascinating snapshot of music industry excess just before the business was kneecapped by streaming. In 2025 it can't help but pose questions about whether joining a band, jumping in a van and trying to start a revolution is even a dream anyone entertains anymore. For Timoner, Dig! was always supposed to be about larger themes than just the warring bands at the centre of the narrative. An idealistic student at Yale in the early 1990s, she had hit on the idea while trying to release her debut feature, 1994's The Nature of the Beast, about an incarcerated woman in Connecticut. The compromises and sacrifices she had to make in order to get the film out into the world left her questioning her pursuit of the artist's life. 'Is my heart just going to be broken?' she remembers thinking when we speak. 'Am I going to destroy everything just by trying to reach an audience? Is it possible to maintain your integrity and accomplish that? I thought looking at bands would be the best way to answer that question.' At the time, America's alternative music scene was still dominated by the grunge emanating from Seattle, but a host of younger groups on the West Coast wanted to return to a janglier, more melodic sound. Timoner and her brother David started filming 10 struggling bands trying to make it, but it was only after they got turned onto the retro, Sixties-indebted sound of the Jonestown that their film took flight. 'Everyone else we were filming was cowering in the shadows of the industry and waiting for their free lunch,' Timoner says. 'By contrast, Anton was like: 'I'm the letter writer, they're the postman.'' The night of the Viper Room show, Newcombe told Timoner: 'We're starting a revolution. Go meet the Dandy Warhols. We're taking over your documentary.' The Dandy Warhols, led by the high-cheekboned rock god-in-waiting Courtney Taylor-Taylor, are a Portland-based psych rock group who had played with the Jonestown and bonded with them over their shared love of shoegaze guitars and recreational narcotics. Both bands were early in their careers, and Timoner found in Newcombe and Taylor-Taylor the perfect foils with which to explore her art vs commerce thesis. Where Newcombe was endlessly creative but also tortured and often self-sabotaging, Taylor-Taylor was able to play by the industry's rules enough to land his band a major label record deal, shoot a music video with celebrity photographer David LaChapelle and eventually hit it big in the UK after letting their 2000 single 'Bohemian Like You' be used in an advert for a mobile phone company. The film is just the tip of the iceberg. That kind of intensity was every day. It was exhausting, but we were young, so you have more energy for chaos Billy Pleasant, Jonestown drummer In one telling scene in Dig!, Newcombe hosts a sordid party at his squat-like LA base, only for the Dandys to turn up the next morning and stage a photo shoot there. 'That photo shoot is so poignant, and so emblematic of their relationship dynamic because [the Dandys are] like: we'll visit, but we don't want to stay in this squalor,' says Timoner. 'Anton cultivates a certain edge and creates from that place, [whereas] Courtney is like a tourist.' Zia McCabe, the Dandys' keyboardist, witnessed both the obvious affection and later tension between the two frontmen up close. 'For Anton, music is life or death,' she explains over video from Portland, pointing out that music poured out of Newcombe whether he liked it or not. 'Courtney has to wait for those precious moments and then capitalise on them. I think he's always been a bit jealous that Anton can't shut it off, but really, if you step back and look at the big picture, quality of life often suffers, right?' The Timoners (Ondi and her brother David) followed the two bands for seven years between 1996 and 2003, eventually piecing together Dig! from over 2,500 hours of footage. That gave them a front-row seat for Newcombe's descent into heroin addiction and his band's often disastrous low-budget tours, marred by frequent breakups and occasional drug arrests. 'The film is just the tip of the iceberg,' remembers erstwhile Jonestown drummer Billy Pleasant. 'There just happened to be a camera rolling on the bits that everybody sees but, my gosh, that kind of intensity was every day. It was exhausting, but we were young, so you have more energy for chaos.' At the opposite end of the spectrum, the filmmakers also prolonged the production in order to capture the Dandys' rise through the upper echelons of pop culture. 'They did keep wanting to wrap it up, and then s*** just kept happening [to the Dandys] that they couldn't not put in the film,' remembers McCabe, who was 19 when she joined the band. 'I was young and I had given up questioning anything, so everything was just my reality. 'Oh, now we do major labels. Now we fly to other countries. Now we have tour buses. Oh, a film crew comes and films every single thing you do.'' When the film debuted at Sundance in 2004, it was an instant hit, winning the Grand Jury Prize in the documentary category. 'I've had a lot of films at Sundance, but nothing that caused that kind of kinetic reaction,' recalls Timoner, pointing out that the film spoke to the wider artistic experience. 'People say: 'What is Dig! about? Well, it's about these two bands, you know, it's about art versus commerce, but it's also about friendship and rivalry and madness and mental health.' The film reached an even wider audience when it became a featured inflight movie on Virgin Atlantic and entered the zeitgeist enough that the Jonestown's onstage brawl was spoofed on the US TV comedy-drama Gilmore Girls. The band's impish tambourine player, Joel Gion, makes an appearance in the episode. '[The writers] were just fans of the movie,' Gion explains when I call him to ask how that unlikely cameo came about. 'It was weird, but I get more steady checks from [that programme] than I do from being in the band.' Gion is one of the stars of the original movie – it was his face, complete with bug-eyed sunglasses, that adorned the posters. He often plays the role of comic relief, keeping things light as his band implodes around him. 'For me, the minute the camera got put in my face I immediately envisioned a movie audience out there,' he remembers. 'I just went straight into 'Beatles movie' zone. You know, the Maysles Brothers' film about the Beatles' first US visit when they're on the train? That's what I grew up on. That's what made me want to be in a band. I'm not talking to Ondi behind the camera or to myself about how fabulous what I'm doing is. I'm talking to some imaginary audience. That was a pretty far-flung stretch of the imagination when you're living on a mattress in a punk rock band factory, but I'm not mad at how it turned out.' In Dig! XX, Gion provides additional narration, counterbalancing the original voiceover by Taylor-Taylor and adding background for many of the Jonestown sequences. The end of the new version brings the story up to date and shows that however precarious their existence appeared in 2004, both bands have defied the odds and are still together, touring and making music. 'Cutting the new ending was emotional, because it's a happy ending. They're all still here,' says David Timoner, who edited the second film. 'When we had the idea for this new version of the film I said I'd love to end it with both bands onstage embracing. It turned out they were playing in Austin, so we got someone to film it and it happened! We had that kumbaya ending, and then [another onstage Jonestown fight in] Melbourne happened, which was kind of perfect too. It's still the Brian Jonestown Massacre. It's still Dig! It's uncanny, the footage of the fight is like a mirror image of the original.' For those who featured in the film, such as the original Dandys drummer Eric Hedford, watching the new version is an emotional experience. 'It brings up a lot of feelings of that time,' he says. 'It's like a wild movie yearbook of my twenties. I get a bit of post-traumatic stress when I watch it, but I'm old enough now to have nostalgia for those days.' For younger viewers discovering Dig! for the first time, the film may appear to depict an alien species. The reason the bands are so willing to squeeze themselves in tiny vans and traverse the country is largely because there was no better way of getting their music out to eager listeners. Today it's possible to send a song around the world at the tap of a touchscreen, but the financial realities have squeezed already thin margins sharply. To be a touring band hoping to find a pot of gold at the end of a run of shows may now be an antiquated concept. Dig! is a time capsule of a more optimistic, hedonistic time for the music industry. 'One major issue that's different now than it was for us is access to income,' points out McCabe. 'I worked two days a week as a dishwasher, lived with five roommates, had food stamps and state health insurance, and we could afford our rock'n'roll lifestyle. We had time to be artists. Now, if you have time to be an artist that means either your parents are backing you or you have a successful OnlyFans. That curtails access to being able to make music and art, because everybody's got to work 40 to 60 hours. That is horses***.' Gion agrees. 'If people don't know who you are, because you can't afford to record, because you have to work, because there's no money in recorded music, then none of this works,' he says. His dream, he adds, is that some of the people who watch Dig! XX get inspired to start doing things their own way. 'We've silenced an entire group of people that have to bump and scrape and fight to live, who maybe have more to say,' he argues. 'It's been a long time since we had a punk rock or psychedelic revolution. People have got to get f***ed-with enough by these breadhead fat cats to [a point where] some new explosion happens, and the landgrabbers in charge of music are told that this won't fly.'
