Vinyl: The Complete First Season Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		2.5
Overall		3.5

Vinyl: The Complete First Season Blu-ray Movie Review

Record dealer.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman May 31, 2016

There’s a truism in the music industry that artists who experience a huge rush of success with their first release often then experience a so- called “sophomore slump”, with their second outings not as well received, either critically or by the record (and/or download) buying public. That same tendency may also be affecting the current powerhouse on broadcast television dealing with the record business, with more and more people evidently becoming aware that (as I mentioned in the review of its first season) Empire, for all its high energy excesses, is at its core simply a sudsy family drama in the well worn tradition of Dallas and Dynasty, albeit with perhaps just slightly less ridiculous clothes and hairstyles. Empire is still raking in impressive viewership numbers, though they’re down noticeably from first season highs, an indication that even an “exotic” setting can’t keep a show afloat if the writers depend on hoary clichés like killing off a major character in a season ending cliffhanger (one prays that Empire’s third season does not begin with Cookie awakening to the sound of a shower). The more fanciful aspects of Empire tend not to inform the at least somewhat similar Vinyl, a show it isn’t hard to imagine might have been pitched to HBO in the wake of Empire’s staggering first season success. Vinyl plays a bit like Empire in its depiction of the often chaotic and freewheeling music business, but it takes a page from American Hustle and places its story largely in the 1970s (speaking of ridiculous fashion and hairstyles). While still fairly farfetched in a number of ways, Vinyl has a much grittier ambience than Empire, which is kind of ironic given Empire’s supposed “street cred” as a drama focusing on an African American entrepreneur and his family. Buoyed by the twin imprimaturs of co-creators and executive producers Martin Scorsese and Mick Jagger (whose son James appears in a featured role), Vinyl is an actors’ showcase, offering a brilliant turn by Bobby Canavale as Richie Finestra, the founder of American Century Records who, as the flower power of the 1960s has begun to wilt under the oppressive heat of the 1970s, finds his “baby” in desperate straits. Richie isn’t in much better shape himself, as the series documents in an early scene which finds the label founder with a pretty serious cocaine monkey on his back. Richie at least is self aware enough to know he’s seriously addled, and part of the fascination of the series is that it’s told more or less by Richie, who warns the audience from the get go that he is at best an unreliable narrator.

Vinyl indulges in at least a few of the very same plot points that Empire has already trafficked in, including finding “the next big thing” and (perhaps a bit more hyperbolically) a murder investigation, and like Empire, the series struggles at times to find a balance between a realistic, character driven, story and plot machinations that often teeter precariously toward the soap operatic. The tale opens with Finestra being close to finalizing a sale to German Polygram (the show often incorporates supposed “real life” entities and even characters into its overall fictional universe), one that Finestra needs since American Century has been bleeding cash for sometime. Finestra has assured his potential German suitors that not only is American Century’s balance sheet in the black (it isn’t, of course), the company’s finances are guaranteed to improve dramatically since Finestra claims he’s close to finalizing another deal with a little band called Led Zeppelin.

Finestra, perhaps the spiritual “father” of the coders in Silicon Valley, seems to have an almost genetic propensity toward snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, something that continues the color the first season as the Zeppelin deal (and therefore the Polygram deal) don’t exactly go the happily ever after route. The business dealings here are sometimes a bit on the arcane side (like weird rules governing refunds for returned unsold albums), but are often among the more interesting elements in what is often an overstuffed plot. Less successful are the Empire-esque roilings of an at least somewhat dysfunctional family life, though in this case Richie isn’t dealing with an ex-wife, but instead a current spouse named Devon (Olivia Wilde), an erstwhile Andy Warhol acolyte whose background is detailed cursorily but which is at least as interesting as that of the supposed focal character.

If the family dynamics never seem to create the same surfeit of histrionics that they often do in Empire, there’s almost more of a Mad Men vibe to some of the business shenanigans, especially with regard to young A&R whiz Jamie Vine (Juno Bell), who seems to be written to be this show’s Peggy Olson. Jamie’s attempts to promote a proto-punk band fronted by Kip Stevens (James Jagger, son of you know who) provide some of the first season’s best material, even if it seems awfully calculated at times. (The Mad Men reference is just as noticeable in the series' attention to production design detail in its recreation of a specific era.)

The large supporting cast is routinely excellent, and the show offers fantastic opportunities for an almost unrecognizable Ray Romano as one of Richie’s chief aides, a kind of well meaning schlub named Zak Yankovich. Max Casella is also excellent as Julie Silver, the head of A&R who may or may not be that thrilled with Jamie’s “up and coming” status. The series makes the party atmosphere of a 1970s era record company something of a running element, and Jamie’s singular “talents” in this regard play into the season as well.

On the whole, though, Vinyl suffers from a certain fraying of its narrative momentum. It in fact often plays quite a bit like Richie himself, which is probably entirely appropriate if not entirely intended. Richie is kind of a lost soul, tooling about searching for answers and (for a while at least) masking his tortured emotional state with copious amounts of drugs. Vinyl similarly scatters its energies looking for its own “next big thing”, and it’s yet to be seen whether that discovery will allow the show to avoid its own sophomore slump.

Vinyl: The Complete First Season Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Vinyl: The Complete First Season is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of HBO with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. Perhaps surprisingly given its gritty and "grainy" look, the IMDb lists Vinyl as having been digitally shot with Arri Alexa and Sony CineAlta cameras, though it's obvious that the show has been put through the processing mill in post to give it more of a filmic appearance, one that is perhaps meant to subliminally suggest the time period in which it's placed. The look is quite ingratiating, if not exactly "organic" in the sense that it looks completely natural. There's a thickness to the imagery here that is patently different from the sleek, smooth and often surface deep look of a lot of digital capture, but it's also a somewhat mottled and soft looking appearance at times. That tends to be especially noticeable in some of the many dimly lit club or party scenes where the digital grain along with attendant haze and smoke from "party favors" can tend to wash over scenes and give them a really gauzy look. Shadow detail can be a bit problematic in the darkest scenes, but in brightly lit environments, detail pops convincingly, offering great looks at the perhaps slightly comical fashions of the 1970s.

Vinyl: The Complete First Season Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

As befits its subject matter, Vinyl's DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track is a riot of source cues, and the music spills through the surrounds with aplomb in virtually every episode in this first season. A couple of unexpected uses of LFE (including a calamitous "climax" to a concert in the premiere, directed by Scorsese) offers some surprising low end, though a lot of the music's heavy bass lines and drumming come close to duplicating that kind of force. Dialogue is cleanly presented and is generally well prioritized, though occasional lines get swallowed in some of the noisier moments.

Vinyl: The Complete First Season Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Disc One

• Inside the Episodes

  Episode 1 "Pilot" (1080i; 2:46)

  Episode 2 "Yesterday Once More" (1080i; 2:42)

• Audio Commentary on "Yesterday Once More" features Bobby Cannavale, Olivia Wilde, Ray Romano, Allen Coulter and Terence Winter

Disc Two

• Inside the Episodes

  Episode 4 "The Racket" (1080i; 3:27)

  Episode 5 "He in Racist Fire" (1080i; 3:04)

• Audio Commentary on "Whispered Secrets" features Max Casella, Juno Temple, Jack Quaid, Mark Romanek and Terence Winter

Disc Three

• Inside the Episodes

  Episode 6 "Cyclone" (1080i; 3:41)

  Episode 7 "The King and I" (1080i; 3:57)

  Episode 8 "E.A.B." (1080i; 4:31)

• Audio Commentary on "E.A.B." features Bobby Cannavale, Olivia Wilde, Randall Poster, Meghan Currier and Terence Winter

Disc One

• Inside the Episodes

  Episode 9 "Rock and Roll Queen" (1080i; 3:16)

  Episode 10 "Alibi" (1080i; 6:25)

• Making Vinyl: Recreating the '70s (1080p; 18:32) features some good behind the scenes footage and decent interviews, including with Martin Scorsese.

Vinyl: The Complete First Season Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

While I've given the same overall score to Vinyl that I did to Empire, I'd boost Vinyl at least incrementally if I were able to, since (for me, anyway) it resonates much more convincingly than Empire does. Vinyl nonetheless stumbles narratively, going off on tangents like a coke fiend with ADHD, though some of its developing plot points certainly seem to be fertile grounds for exploitation down the line. Performances are uniformly excellent, helping to buoy the storytelling past some bumps in the road. Technical merits are strong, and Vinyl comes Recommended.