"The marvel of Billy, of course, is that in an era when being trans was apt to get one killed, he chose to 'hide in plain sight', concealing that he was assigned female at birth while embracing a profession that made him the constant center of attention" - the Daily Beast writes about the doc 'No Ordinary Man' which examines the life of Billy Tipton, a talented jazz artist in the 1940s and 1950s who, upon his death, was revealed to have been assigned female at birth. "That trailblazing courage is clearly an inspiration for everyone featured in Chin-Yee and Joynt’s film, who speak about his plight—and the bravery he exhibited in being himself, no matter the obstacles—with palpable reverence".

"Posing the question 'What makes an image iconic?' the [‘Icon: Music Through the Lens’] series seeks answers through the studio portraits, record sleeves, music magazines, live shows, exhibitions, social media, coffee table books and the fine art world" - PBS' press release reads about the new 6-part series.

Among dozens of nominees for this year's Emmys, there are some music ones. Apple TV’s 'Billie Eilish: The World’s A Little Blurry' documentary is up for three awards, whereas David Byrne’s HBO special 'David Byrne: American Utopia' has been nominated in eight categories. The New York Times’ docu 'Framing Britney Spears' is up for two awards. Elsewhere in the nominations, Cynthia Erivo picked up a nod for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie, for her role portraying the late Aretha Franklin in the National Geographic miniseries 'Genius: Aretha', whereas Marcus Mumford is nominated for his 'Ted Lasso' theme, in the category of Outstanding Original Main Title Theme Music. Check the full list at EW.

The Who's career-spanning documentary, 'Amazing Journey: The Story of the Who' is now available to stream for the first time on the Coda Collection. Anchored by interviews with Townshend and Roger Daltrey, the film tracks the band’s rise and career, and features a trove of previously unseen footage and performance clips. 'Amazing Journey' was directed by Murray Lerner and Paul Crowder and first released in 2007.

The trailer for the six-part documentary series 'McCartney 3, 2, 1', featuring Paul McCartney and Rick Rubin has been released. It shows big-shot producer and big-shot bassist dissecting Beatles classics like 'Come Together', 'All My Loving', 'With a Little Help From My Friends', and 'In My Life'.

“When you’re wearing diamonds, it’s like a big f-you to everybody” - a new docu about jewelry in hip-hop culture dropped today, explores. "How and when did jewelry become part of Hip Hop culture? A$AP Ferg, Migos, Lil Yachty, Talib Kweli weigh in alongside 80’s heavyweights Eric B & Rakim and Slick Rick to see the much deeper meaning and purpose behind it all".

"The event hosted 400,000 miserable attendees, as excessive heat and poor planning combined for one of the worst debacles in modern festival history. The crowd turned violent, at one point tearing plywood off the walls and setting it on fire. The concerts gave way to multiple reports of rape and sexual assault, as well as looting, vandalism, and arson" - Consequence announces the first trailer for 1999 music-fest-turned-gore-fest. It is the first in a series of HBO documentaries executive produced by Bill Simmons, and it features Korn’s Jonathan Davis, The Roots’ Tariq “Black Thought” Trotter, Jewel, Moby, Creed’s Scott Stapp, and The Offspring.

"Woodstock itself wasn’t the life-changing event. The life-changing event was the Woodstock movie. I wonder if this film had come out and been held up in the same light and importance, would this have made a difference in my life?" - Questlove says to Pitchfork about 'Summer of Soul', his new documentary about the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival. "This film is potent enough now to work its magic in ways that it wasn’t allowed to 50 years ago. Black people and history - it’s a painful thing. That plays a role in why it’s easy to forget things. I’m very happy that people see this now. But it’s a deeper well that we have to dig, and this film might be just the beginning of it". It's in theaters and on Hulu.

A lovely documentary 'The Dancing Man of LA' about a grey-haired 69-year-old who goes to, well, almost to all the concerts in Los Angeles, and dances all the time. Howard Mordoh is a retired clinical laboratory scientist from and his "love of concerts spans genres, venues, and decades - and he's always dancing. But with live music canceled during the COVID pandemic, and given his husband's health concerns, Howard has to get creative in order to keep dancing".

The director Beth B "is not interested in showing Lunch’s abrasive attitudes in a flattering light, and her take-her-as-she-comes approach extends to the doc’s account of musical metamorphosis" - Hollywood Reporter reviewed 'The War Is Never Over' the first career-spanning documentary of the 1970s No Wave icon Lydia Lunch. "B. leaves no stone unturned when it comes to Lydia Lunch ephemera. There’s great live footage from all of her music projects and spoken-word events. It’s a treasure trove that long-time fans will love" - Film Threat writes enthusiastically.

Producer and songwriter Mark Ronson goes into the art and science of music production in the new docu-series 'Watch the Sound', coming to Apple TV+ on July 30, NME reports. The newly released trailer shows him talking with the likes of Paul McCartney, Dave Grohl, Beastie Boys Ad-Rock and Mike D, Charli XCX, Josh Homme, Denzel Curry, Angel Olsen, Tame Impala mastermind Kevin Parker and many mor

The short documentary 'Field of Vision - We Were There to Be There', by Mike Plante and Jason Willis, on a legendary 1978 show at a California psychiatric hospital by the Cramps and the Mutants, is now online. "Taking place as cuts to crucial social services loom under Ronald Reagan, two legendary punk bands come together to perform a show for patients and staff at a psychiatric facility". It "threads moments from the Napa State Hospital set with commentary from band members and those who witnessed it firsthand, providing a crucial backstory for the recording of one of the most iconic shows in the history of music, at a critical moment in the future of mental health care in the US".

Peter Jackson has expanded his upcoming Beatles documentary from a standalone film to a mini-series composed of three two-hour installments, Vanity Fair reports. 'The Beatles: Get Back' chronicles the making of The Beatles’ penultimate album, 1970’s 'Let It Be', whereas part of the reason for its expansion was due to the insistence of Jackson, Paul McCartney, and Ringo Starr to have the full rooftop concert on London’s Savile Row - the final performance of the band’s career - shown in full. 'The Beatles: Get Back' will air over Thanksgiving weekend.

Fact has a documentary by Mia Zur-Szpiro about some of the key women working in India’s electronic music scene. Filmed across several months, it features interviews with women artists in the Indian scene, touching on themes of mental health, spirituality, overcoming racial and patriarchal prejudice and the impact music has had on their lives.

'The Right to Rock' tells the story of Filipino American sisters June and Jean Millington who in the late 19602 formed ferocious garage band Fanny. They were the first all-women band signed to a multi-album major label, and who used this platform to fight racism, sexism, and homophobia. "With members nearing age 70, it’s wonderful to see Fanny connecting with a new generation of listeners" - MJI writes presenting Bobbi Jo Hart’s documentary.

Richard Benson is an English guitarist based in Italy. Watching him in action, it’s evident he knows how to play and he understands musical concepts but his guitar methods are unorthodox. His audiences come to see him play so they can throw food at him. Benson is willing to be a punchline to perform in front of an audience for the love of his art. He’s obviously passionate and dedicated, but at what point do you face the fact that people don’t just dislike your expression of music, they hate it - Medium gets curious about the strange man. There's also a short docu about the anti-guitarist.

If there was a year when music was the agent of change it was 1971, the new Apple TV+ docuseries '1971: The Year That Music Changed Everything' argues, Rolling Stone reports. The documentary was inspired by the book 'Never a Dull Moment: 1971 the Year That Rock Exploded' by David Hepworth, and it features footage of artists, many of whom have albums turning 50 this year, including George Harrison, Marvin Gaye, Joni Mitchell, Aretha Franklin, the Rolling Stones, John Lennon, Bill Withers, Elton John, Graham Nash, Bob Marley, Alice Cooper, and more. The eight-part docuseries also touches on the post-counterculture era and political and social upheaval.

'Punk the Capital: Building a Sound Movement' is the first documentary to tell the story of Washington D.C.’s influential punk and DIY movement from the turn of the 1970s to the 1980s. The 88-minute documentary features some of the biggest names from the D.C. scene, such as H.R. from the Bad Brains, Ian MacKaye from Minor Threat and Fugazi, Henry Rollins from the Black Flag, Jello Biafra from the Dead Kennedys, and others, Consequence reports. It comes out May 14.

‘I’m Going to Break Your Heart’ is a documentary about singer-songwriters Raine Maida (of the group Our Lady Peace) and Chantal Kreviazuk, who comprise the duo Moon Vs Sun, who are trying to save their marriage by making music together, in front of the camera. Variety likes the marriage-as-a-band premise of the docu: "The two escape from L.A. for a songwriting retreat on the French island of Saint Pierre, only to be constantly rubbing each other the wrong way in the collaborative process. That Maida and Kreviazuk are also husband and wife does lend some extra stakes when they battle it out as co-writers: This might be the first marital-drama documentary that has, at its crux, irreconcilable differences over a pre-chorus".

An informative yet fun documentary 'Why Am I Doing This? (A Film ABout Touring)', about underground bands playing small clubs. Steve Albini and members of Bottomless Pit, Helms Alee, Wimps, the Bismarck, Nudity, Conan Neutron, Sun 0))), and Melvins talk about what really is there on tour, beyond the 1-hour pleasure they do get every day.

Greenwich Village folk musician Eric Andersen was friends with Bob Dylan, Lou Reed, Joni Mithcell, Janis Joplin, Andy Warhol, but never had a big career, which a new documentary 'The Songpoet' tries to find an answer to. Rolling Stone interviewed the songpoet about his past, and success that was within his grasp plenty of times but he never managed to get hold of it. Andersen says Warhol once gave him "a beautiful painting and signed it. I sold it dirt cheap to a German buyer. Fast forward, years later, I open The New York Times and there’s a full-page ad with my fucking painting for sale for something like $12.5 million". His album 'Stages' was lost for 20 years, and Andersen believes it was lost intentionally - "instantaneously and unwittingly, not through will or a life choice, you instantly become a Buddhist - because if you get attached to this, it will destroy you. Even though it’s your work". Just when Brian Epstein was about to take him and manage him, the Beatles manager had died. Plenty of his musician friends, however, are dead - "the music business isn’t especially conducive to good health" - Andersen is alive, living with his wife in the Netherlands.

The production team behind the 'Framing Britney Spears' documentary are reportedly at work on a new film about Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake’s infamous 2004 Super Bowl Halftime show and the "wardrobe malfunction" which had dire consequences for Jackson, Page Six reports. While Timberlake went on to release a smash album in 2006, 'FutureSex/LoveSounds', Jackson was essentially blacklisted from Viacom-owned networks like MTV and CBS and saw her career all but halted. Jackson was also tacitly banned from playing the Super Bowl again, while Timberlake headlined in 2018. The documentary is "going to be all about the fallout and the suits who fucked over Janet [at] Viacom”.

The first trailer for Questlove’s documentary 'Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised)', premiered at the Oscars last night (watch it below). 'Summer of Soul' focuses on the little-known history of the Harlem Cultural Festival, dubbed “the Black Woodstock,” which took place the same summer as Woodstock in 1969 over the course of six weeks in New York's Harlem. The lineup included Sly and the Family Stone, Stevie Wonder, Nina Simone, B.B. King, Gladys Knight and the Pips, and more. The clip juxtaposes many of these performances with the cultural and sociopolitical upheaval happening at the time. 'Summer of Soul' is Questlove’s directorial debut, and it was already awarded both the U.S. Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award in the U.S. Documentary category at the Sundance Film Festival.

Lisa Rovner’s archival documentary celebrates the women whose breakthroughs in early electronic music laid the foundations of modern electronic styles. The focus falls on about nine or 10 women in the field, including experimental music pioneer Clara Rockmore, British composer and mathematician Delia Derbyshire who co-created the 'Doctor Who' theme, and Suzanne Ciani, the first woman to score a major Hollywood movie - 'The Incredible Shrinking Woman' in 1981. Guardian gave it five stars, describing it as "superb" and "electrifying". The Wall Street Journal starts with a provocative premise: "that the frontiers of electronic music were blazed by women".

Rockfield is known as the world’s first residential studio - a former farm remade to a studio, where Black Sabbath, Queen, Robert Plant, Oasis, Coldplay, Simple Minds, and more made their albums. Directed by Hannah Berryman, documentary 'Rockfield: The Studio on the Farm', is out next month featuring interviews with Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi, Liam Gallagher, Robert Plant, Chris Martin, and the Ward family (made the studio and still, after 50 years, own both the farm and the studio, in their 80s).

Foo Fighters' Dave Grohl directed a new movie about touring vans and life on the road called 'What Drives Us', featuring interviews with Lars Ulrich, Slash, the Edge, Flea, Steven Tyler, St. Vincent, and many others. “This film is my love letter to every musician that has ever jumped in an old van with their friends and left it all behind for the simple reward of playing music” - Grohl said.

"I don’t have any right to complain.. When you look at the 8 billion people on the planet, a reasonably affluent caucasian cis-gendered male public figure musician is not necessarily the first person you think of as having valid criticisms about how they’re being treated” - Moby says in a Guardian interview. He is about to release a new album next month - orchestral reworkings of his old hits - as well as a new documentary about his life going from "out of control, utterly entitled, self-involved drink and drug addict" who missed his own mother's funeral because he got drunk, to the producer of philharmonic pieces.

BBC is showing a new documentary 'Black Power: A British Story of Resistance' about the UK's Black Power movement in the late 1960s which aimed to bring a revolution to the status of black people in the UK. It features interviews with past activists, some of which have told about the music that epitomises their journey.

Critics really like the new Tina Turner documentary by Dan Lindsay and T.J. Martin, a "must see", because, as The List says - "whether you're a fan or not, it's hard not to get swept up in the sheer strength of her story". Vulture sees the broader picture: "Frames itself as the final word on this music legend, strongly implying in its closing moments that this two-hour movie is essentially Turner’s farewell to the wider world".

Movie director Andrew Dominik is making a new documentary about Nick Cave and Warren Ellis "attempting to play 'Carnage' and 'Ghosteen' live", Cave has announced in his Red Hand Files blog. Cave also describes how he and Ellis recorded 'Carnage' while not really trying to make a record - "I had been sitting at my desk — suddenly and shockingly not travelling — writing lyrics and poems into a void, with no real objective other than to make sense of this stationary moment. The world felt weird. My body felt weird. I had been jet-lagged for forty-five years. Now my inner clock had begun to tick regularly. Some nights I even slept. I think Warren’s experience was not dissimilar. I think we both felt the enforced stasis, not just unnerving, but also strangely and fitfully energizing, and so, when we began working in the studio, Carnage came out fast and necessary, as proof of life".