December 11, 1965. The Velvet Underground play their first ever concert at a high school in Summit, New Jersey. Most of the kids hated them and walked out, but those who stayed were changed forever. Film maker Robert Pietri was there. Aged 15 he fell in love with the sound of the band and became a lifelong fan. He teamed up with Tony Jannelli to create an animated short about the event, since there are no photos or audio from the actual concert. They hope to raise $30,000 via Kickstarter:
...as a 10th grader sitting in the 3rd row, this was one of the first concerts I had ever been to. It was also my first concert where I witnessed booing, shock, horror, and bewilderment. I’ve always enjoyed telling my story about seeing the Velvet Underground at their, in some minds,
While on stage for merely 20 minutes, The Velvet Underground performed three songs, There She Goes, Venus in Furs, and Heroin. The Summit High School audience responded with, as one of the band recalled in 1983, a “murmur of surprise that greeted our appearance” that “increased to a roar of disbelief as we started to play" which"swelled to a mighty howl of outrage and bewilderment…” Half the audience walked out.
Using eyewitness accounts, we will put you there... in the middle of the first Velvet Underground concert. This short animated documentary film will combine hand-drawn and 2D computer animation techniques in a simple, graphic, and graffiti-like style (or zine-style) that reflects the texture of the period -- mid 1960's.
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