Shakin' All Over tells the story of Canadian music during the halcyon days of the 1960s, before Cancon, Junos and MuchMusic, when so much timeless music was created despite indifferent radio and a nascent record industry. From Halifax to Vancouver, folksingers, suit groups, garage rockers, r&b revues and psychedelic bands struggled to get their music heard, in coffeehouses, community centres, high school dances and hockey arenas. Some were forced to seek fame south of the border, while others stayed at home and built careers against often daunting odds. From Four Strong Winds to Oh What a Feeling, Shakin' All Over relies heavily on songs, mixing rare archival footage with candid interview material, to document the auspicious birth of the Canadian sound.

The documentary is full of candid interviews with over 60 iconic figures like Gordon Lightfoot, Buffy Sainte-Marie and Bruce Cockburn, who offer illuminating stories about each other.

Shakin' All Over also features some of Canada's brightest younger stars, including Blue Rodeo, Barenaked Ladies and Sarah Harmer, who pay tribute to the period.

Special performance footage includes: Early Morning Rain- Gordon Lightfoot, Four Strong Winds-Ian & Sylvia, Signs- Five Man Electrical Band, These Eyes-The Guess Who, Born to Be Wild-Steppenwolf, Spinning Wheel-Blood, Sweat & Tears, Walk That Walk-David Clayton-Thomas & the Shays, Going to the Country-Bruce Cockburn, Back on the Street-Murray McLauchlan, California-Joni Mitchell, and Heart of Gold- Neil Young.

The DVD bonus material features extended interviews with Randy Bachman, Burton Cummings, Anne Murray, Murray McLauchlan, Sylvia Tyson and others.

The Globe and Mail, January 18, 2008

This splendid documentary details that heady era when Canadian bands and artists ranked among the best in the world.

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4.0 out of 5 stars A "Shakin'" Good Time, April 11 2008

By	Valerie L. Shainin "Valerie Magee" (Castle Rock, CO USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Shakin' All Over: Canadian Pop Music in the 1960s, a documentary that initially aired on Canadian TV in January, 2006, was released on DVD in Canada on December 11, 2007.

The two hour special captures the sounds of the decade, from the folk music of Ian and Sylvia, and the rhythm 'n blues of Ronnie Hawkins, to the many other legendary stars like Joni Mitchell, The Guess Who, Neil Young, Anne Murray, The Band, cult heroes like David Wiffen, The Collectors and Mashmakhan, and some of Canada's brightest younger stars including Blue Rodeo, Barenaked Ladies and Sarah Harmer.

The special is full of candid interviews with more than 60 iconic figures like Gordon Lightfoot (of course), Buffy Sainte-Marie and Bruce Cockburn, who offer illuminating stories about each other. The Lightfoot content includes interview segments plus clips of archival performances of "Canadian Railroad Trilogy," "Early Morning Rain" and "Did She Mention My Name." It also features a clip of Ron Sexsmith's cover of "If You Could Read My Mind." And, strewn throughout are mentions by other artists of Lightfoot's influence on them and on the emergence of Canadian music worldwide.

In addition to the original two hour broadcast, the DVD has bonus interviews with several of the key artists, including a new interview with Lightfoot. Other bonus interviews are with Randy Bachman, Bruce Cockburn, Burton Cummings, Robbie Lane, Murray McLauchlan, Anne Murray, Buffy Sainte-Marie and Sylvia Tyson. The interviews are pieced together from what I assume were live interview sessions, and offer some interesting insights into the experiences and influences of each of these artists. Would you believe Lightfoot mentions Bruce Springsteen as a creative influence?

Shakin' All Over is based on the book "Before the Gold Rush - Flashbacks to the Dawn of the Canadian Sound" (sadly out of print), by Nicholas Jennings, who also wrote the liner notes for two Lightfoot CD releases. Jennings has followed the Canadian music scene for decades, and his knowledge and insight probably make him the premier Canadian music historian. (His wonderful biography of Lightfoot in the Songbook boxed set is a "must read" for any Lightfoot fan).

Although one does wish that full performances were included, this DVD still stands on its own as a documentary, and sheds new light on the history of Canadian music, while featuring some of her greatest musical talents.

No word yet about a US release.
� 2008 Valerie L. Shainin, webmaster gordonlightfoot.com

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1.0 out of 5 stars A great opportunity missed, Feb 11 2008

By	Tycho Manson (Toronto, ON Canada) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This DVD is a major disappointment. The story of Canadian rock in the '60s is a wonderful one, and it deserves a proper documentary treatment. Shakin' All Over isn't it.

I don't think the fault is the writing; Nicholas Jennings, who wrote this documentary (based on his book Before The Gold Rush), knows his stuff and is enthusiastic about it. The fault seems to lie, instead, in a host of misconceived decisions presumably made by the producers.

First, and most fundamentally, we don't get enough old footage or music. From the little snippets that are shown in Shakin' All Over, it's clear that the CBC has a wealth of archival material from this era, much of it from teen shows of the time like Let's Go and Music Hop. So why not show more of that in the documentary? Instead, we get brief snippets, sometimes no more than a few seconds long. If the producers wanted us to see how great this stuff was, why didn't they show it to us?

No, instead -- and here's the really bad part -- we get endless effusive talking-head interviews with contemporary artists like Steven Page and Sarah Slean and Jay Ferguson from Sloan and others. You have to wonder if this was some producer's sad idea of how to make all this creaky old '60s music "relevant" to a contemporary audience: get contemporary figures to tell all the young kids today how great it was!

Well it doesn't work, at all. No offence to the contemporary artists, but most of them don't manage to add anything to our understanding of the artists they're discussing, instead just telling us how much they love them. Well, so what? So do we; if we didn't we wouldn't be watching.

All the time wasted on these interviews would have been put to better use showing more archival footage, or giving us longer, more detailed interviews with some of the people who actually were around in the 60s and 70s and do get interviewed (Bernie Finkelstein, Luke Gibson, Gene Martynec, Murray McLauchlan, Dom Troiano, etc.).

Finally, a big part of the problem is that the documentary tries to cram too much material into too short a time. This creates all kinds of weird continuity issues and leads to some unintentionally comical results; for example the segment on Neil Young has him going from Winnipeg to Yorkville to LA and back to his famous Massey Hall show in a matter of seconds, with only a brief glancing mention of the Buffalo Springfield. If you didn't already know the facts, you'd end up thinking that the Massey Hall show was Neil's breakthrough.

As I mentioned above, it's obvious that a ton of old footage exists in the vaults of Canadian television from shows like Let's Go, etc. Someone should arrange to get all that stuff out on DVD. It would do a better job of telling the story of this music than this documentary does.

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