Rite Here Rite Now is an extremely well-produced directed and concert film that features everyone’s favorite clergyman, Cardinal Copia aka Papa Emeritus IV, as he gives his final performances before his inevitable demise and a new Papa gets ushered in.

Having been an unabashed Ghost fan from Day One, I can say that the film very clearly and cleverly captures the excitement, thrill, and pageantry of a live Ghost performance… er… ritual. Filmed over the course of the last two dates of the 2023 tour at the Kia Forum in Los Angeles, fans are treated to an outstanding set of songs that ranges all the back to the first record.

What distinguishes the film from other concert films are the cutaway scenes that form a distinct narrative that tells the story of how Papa IV or “Cardi” as he’s referred to in the film, deals with the end of his own existence as leader of the Ghost congregation. Guided by Papa Nihil, the original Papa from back in the day, Cardi is also helped along by his mother, who has challenges of her own to deal with throughout the film. We actually learn of how Papa Nihil and Mom get together in an animated segment of the film that was played to “Mary on a Cross.”

The story is novel and humorous and allows fans to get a behind-the-scenes look, so to speak, about the tribulations of Cardi, and what he has to do to keep the performance at its peak, however, the main reason to see the film is the concert footage. The viewer feels fully immersed in the experience, with an impressive production quality in terms of both sight and sound.

Highlights of the film for me were the performances of the opener, “Kaisarion,” which really captured the explosive energy of the band, as well as “Twenties,” performed for the first time live and with skeleton dancers no less! “Twenties” is not one of my favorite Ghost tunes, however, it has a completely different feel to it live.

Another standout was the acoustic “If You Have Ghost,” which featured two cellos and piano accompaniment along with Ghoulette backing vocals. This was from the “B Stage,” giving us a different perspective on the performance and showing us just a glimpse of the emotion from Tobias Forge as he seems to realize the magnitude of what he’s built and created over the past several years.

Carefully curated crowd shots that show the sheer joy of the fans, and the up-close shots of the band make you feel like you’re in the ritual yourself. Meshed with the crowded movie theater, with many folks wearing their Ghost Sunday best, creates a truly devotional experience.

If I had a complaint about the film it would be that we don’t get to see the complete performance of “Miasma,” which the Nameless Ghouls absolutely crush live. I could also complain about the ending – really the after-credits reveal – but I can say it’s done in typical Ghost tongue-in-cheek fashion that will make you slightly angry but will also make you laugh at the same time.

Viewers get to hear a new song during the credits, which has now also been released to the general public, with “The Future is a Foreign Land.” Love the backing vocals by the Ghoulettes on this one as well.

Tobias Forge continues to impress and outdo himself time and time again. I’ve certainly seen many concert films over the years but Rite Here Rite Now is clearly one of the very best. If you have the chance, be sure to see it.

Rating: 10

Early in the documentary It Was All a Dream, the veteran music journalist and filmmaker dream hampton (stylized in lowercase as an homage to the scholar bell hooks), moseys around the offices of The Source magazine, filming her colleagues. The hip hop periodical was, in its early days, a wellspring for understanding the nascent genre. “I learned to be a fan and a critic of some of the greatest artists of a generation,” hampton says in a voiceover that accompanies brief scenes of debate among writers and interviews with editors. The Detroit native moved to New York in 1990 to study film at NYU and a few months later, she joined The Source’s staff. 

Premiering at the Tribeca Film Festival, It Was All a Dream chronicles hampton’s early years in New York. The Surviving R. Kelly (2019) executive producer culls footage from her personal archives (shot between 1993 and 1995) and sets those clips against poetic excerpts of pieces she wrote for The Source, Spin, Village Voice and Vibe between 1993 and 1999.

As a young hampton cruises through the streets of Brooklyn with Biggie Smalls, her present-day self recites early musings about hip hop as a genre of “kamikaze capitalists” and young Black boys “who quickly expanded their tightly wound worlds then set them afire.” Her meditations are drafts, evidence of a feminist thinker and genre custodian in the making.

Hampton wrestles with the reality of hip hop’s commercial traction and misogynistic impulses. The doc is buoyed by her unbridled enthusiasm for tackling big questions of gender, capital and craft. She interviews Biggie, Method Man and Snoop and holds court with Nikki D, Hurricane G and LeShaun. On the table for discussion: albums, aspirations and the unrequited love between men and women in the genre. 

More than a time capsule of an exciting moment in hip-hop, It Was All a Dream makes a compelling case for fastidious documentation and preservation, especially in music journalism. (Hampton recently directed an episode of Netflix’s docuseries on female rappers, Ladies First.) The film is a trove of information about some of the earliest days in a genre some people thought wouldn’t survive. It shows how contemporary conversations about distribution and misogyny extend into the past, where they were also topics of fervent debate.

When hampton convenes with rappers like Nikki D, LeShaun and executives like Tracey Waples to talk about fortifying a community of women in hip hop, it adds a thrilling layer to the current landscape, which includes, for example, new-gen collaborations between Megan Thee Stallion and Cardi B.

An interview with Richard Fulton, owner of the coffee and jazz house Fifth Street Dicks in Los Angeles, about who will own the distribution rights of hip hop records in the future connects to Vince Staples and other rappers’ ongoing reflections on the insatiable greed of music labels. It Was All a Dream, like so many archival works, reminds us that the past is the present is the future. 

As a window into the past, It Was All a Dream contextualizes parts of hip hop and pushes against convenient amnesia. Hampton takes us around the country, from Bedford Stuyvesant to Venice Beach, to show how rappers in different locales experiment with rhyming styles and samples. She loosely organizes her doc around geography, using title cards with neighborhood names to demarcate a new section.

Hampton also digs into modes of self-expression and coastal beefs; she lets artists wax poetic about what their music will help them achieve. Hip hop, then and now, was a site of play, a political tool, a repository for hopes and dreams. 

It Was All a Dream also offers rare perspectives from some of the genre’s greatest acts and enduring villains. Biggie freestyling in the studio; Lil’ Kim leaning into the window of his car in one scene; Diddy, whose recent sexual assault allegations have shaken the industry, grooving to a beat. The grainy, shaky and occasionally underlit footage gives It Was All a Dream a coarseness that makes the doc feel more intimate. 

In The Source office, hampton interviews managing editor Chris Wilder, who doubles down on the importance of the publication: “Thirty years from now, if hip hop comes and goes, people will look at The Source to see what happens,” he says.

Listening to Wilder’s words and watching hampton, armed with her camera, confidently interviewing friends and observing mundane moments in the lives of these artists, inspires questions about the current music media landscape. Some of the magazines hampton wrote for still exist in theory, but many have been gutted by lack of funding, venture capital shuffling, the dramatic shift from print to digital and the ease with which charlatans can cosplay as journalists on social media.

Still, a record must be kept and someone must do the keeping. Driven by an awareness of hip hop’s profundity and a commitment to how its story should be told, hampton documented, becoming a custodian of the genre’s history. It Was All a Dream brims with the green energy of an enthusiast and affirms the power individual archives play in building a community narrative.

Published 22 June 2024, 02:30 IST