What the Hell Happened to Blood, Sweat & Tears?

Despite the tightening market, there are still worthwhile music documentaries that bubble to the surface. The best rock documentaries tackle an artist you recall, but has been pushed further into your memory banks out of ignorance or neglect. Clearly filling that criterion is “What the Hell Happened to Blood, Sweat & Tears?” From Director John Scheinfeld, who recently helmed the sparkling “Sergio Mendes in the Key of Joy” documentary, this film answers the eponymous question.

I banter often with friends about what is the best horn rock band. Generally, the argument comes down to Blood, Sweat & Tears or Chicago. In both cases, the best albums came early. But in the latter case, longevity certainly helps the argument. Indeed, Chicago still tours regularly, but in the most recent times I’ve seen them their set list fortunately relied on the early material. Many early fans fell away from Chicago when Peter Cetera ushered in a soft rock ballad strategy (a few of which songs invariably make the set list, time to get a beer).

As to Blood, Sweat & Tears their early albums indeed included several ballads, but the albums were interspersed with many classic songs that withstand the test of time. Nonetheless, the band has faded from view and Scheinfeld here answers his question in a compelling way.

It evolves that BS&T was caught between two political extremes after accepting an invitation from the State Department to tour the other side of the Iron Curtain in 1970. The political right essentially deemed the band traitors to the American Way and the political left saw the band as cowtowing to The Man.

With significant input from drummer Bobby Colomby, the film paints a more even-handed portrait of how that faithful trip spiraled the band into seeming obscurity. Colomby, essentially the keeper of the BS&T flame, provides a firsthand recollection of being at the sharp leading edge of soft power and the brunt of what we would now call cancel culture.

Scheinfeld has also gathered unreleased footage, unsealed government documents as well as interviews with band members, fellow travelers and historians to assemble an intriguing look into a time when music was at the forefront of culture.

The unlikely mix of politics and music as being the catalyst for the fall of the USSR has been explored admirably in “Free To Rock.” That film has a broader historical sweep (from The Beatles through The Beach Boys, Metallica and Springsteen), but the tighter focus on one band’s demise is what makes “What the Hell Happened to Blood, Sweat & Tears?” such a rewarding and heartbreaking film.

 

More information here:

• “What the Hell Happened to Blood, Sweat & Tears?”
• “Free To Rock”