The Hideout Screens The Greatest Concert Ever, Makes Us Feel Lucky
By Steven Pate in Arts & Entertainment on May 7, 2012 6:00PM
Who are the luckiest kids ever? We nominate Santa Monica, California area High School students in the year 1964.
It was on October 28 and 29 of that year (which were probably sunny and perfect, given that the affluent beach burg gets 310 such days every year) that these lucky ducks were handed free tickets to something called the T.A.M.I. Show. What T.A.M.I. stood for (either Teenage Awards Music International or Teen Age Music International) mattered less than what it was: a two-day concert featuring everybody you wanted to see.
The vibe was a bit "American Bandstand" and the set was awkwardly weird and studded with dancers in the way that mid-sixties music shows tended to be, but oh, the music. The Supremes performed two back-to-back number one hits. Lesley Gore throws down two of her four top 10 singles, including "It's My Party" and "You Don't Own Me." The Beach Boys are there, looking chummy and ecstatic. Marvin Gaye had it on lockdown. Chuck Berry held court.
James Brown tears through four numbers with the Famous Flames that could change your life. "Out of Sight," "Please Please Please," dance moves to end all dance moves and absolute ownership of space and time. Rick Rubin recalls waiting for Prince in his Minneapolis office, where there was a loop of Brown's T.A.M.I. Show performance playing, adding that it "may be the single greatest rock and roll performance ever captured on film." The very fresh-faced Rolling Stones said that agreeing to follow Brown (they wrapped up the concert) was the biggest mistake of their careers.
The best footage (minus, sadly, The Supremes) was edited into one of the most influential concert films in history, a document of generation-defining performances amidst a shuddering sea of screaming teenage throngs that was so undeniably great that it was eventually tapped for the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress a few years ago, and cited as seminal by virtually everybody who came after. The house band is in the Rock and Roll hall of fame, for crying out loud.
The T.A.M.I. Show was available only as a bootleg before being officially released on DVD a couple of years ago. Luckily The Hideout is offering an even better way to take it in, screening T.A.M.I. Show on their patio this Sunday as a bike-in movie. Presented with the Logan Square International Film Series, admission to the bike-in movie is free to everyone 21 and over. You can fill your messenger bags, panniers and saddlebags with all the snacks you want and enjoy beverages from the Hideout's bar. Now in their second year, the bike-in screenings should accommodate 100 to 150 people. It should almost make being a Chicago grown-up in 2012 feel not just lucky, but "1964 Santa Monica Teenager"-lucky.
T.A.M.I. Show screens Sunday, May 13, at The Hideout, 1354 W. Wabansia Ave, 8 p.m., FREE, 21+