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Michael Rapaport picks his favorite music docs

01.01.70

LOS ANGELES — Michael Rapaport clearly loves music. It’s evident in every moment of his documentary, “Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels of a Tribe Called Quest,” the actor’s directing debut about the influential hip-hop group. The film includes the rift that divided the Tribe as well as the tensions that linger today, but a deep admiration for the music itself shines through.

So with the recent Grammy Awards, where “Beats, Rhymes & Life” was nominated for best long form music video, we asked Rapaport to take over the Five Most space to pick his favorite music documentaries. (The film, which came out theatrically last summer, also won top documentary honors from the Producers Guild of America this year.) But since he’s so enthusiastic — and was so nice to join us this week — we let him pick six, in order of preference and in his own words:

∫ “Gimme Shelter” (1970): The Rolling Stones in their prime. Directed by the Maysles Brothers, this is musically incredible. You get to see the Stones being rock stars that don’t exist anymore, and just as important, you see them as vulnerable and as stunned as the audience who witness the shocking events at the overbooked and underplanned Northern California concert that goes really, really wrong. Look for the cameo by a Hells Angels dude wearing a wolf mask.

Source: Daily Herald