It feels strange to think that we’re 20 years removed from one of the most vibrant music scenes in New York City’s history — but in Meet Me in the Bathroom, the documentary adapted from Lizzy Goodman’s 2017 oral history, all it takes is one look at Julian Casablancas‘ 19-year-old face to realize how much things have changed.
At the premiere event in New York City for Meet Me in the Bathroom on Sunday night (October 30th), hundreds of indie lovers packed into Webster Hall to relish in the nostalgia of the city’s undeniable musical output at the dawn of the millennium.
From start to finish, the Meet Me in the Bathroom adaptation, directed by Shut Up and Play The Hits filmmakers Will Lovelace and Dylan Southern, is certainly the time capsule it promises to be, and it’s filled with fascinating live footage and interview clips from The Strokes, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Interpol, LCD Soundsystem, TV on the Radio, The Moldy Peaches, and more. If members of the scene had ever boasted that “you had to be there,” well, the Meet Me in the Bathroom doc is certainly the closest we can get.
To celebrate the documentary’s NYC premiere, The Moldy Peaches’ Adam Green made an appearance to perform and offer his insights in a discussion with author Lizzy Goodman and the film’s directors. In addition to a performance from WAH Together (which features members of LCD Soundsystem and The Rapture), the premiere event was a successful converging of 2000s nostalgia with the necessary acknowledgment of today’s wildly different rock scene.
The documentary depicts major political and social changes, such as 9/11, the rise of Napster and pirated music, gentrification, and the war in Iraq as the attention on these young bands grew to seismic heights. But it also demonstrates the sheer amount of energy and enthusiasm that these shows boasted, and though the New York scene may never be what it was like in the late ’70s and early 2000s, the spirit will live on.
Read below for our five main takeaways from the Meet Me in the Bathroom documentary, and check out our full review here.
