Dean & Britta “13 Most Beautiful… Songs For Andy Warhol’s Screen Tests” @ the Walker

The McGuire Theater at the Walker Art Center was turned into a mini-Factory on Saturday night, as 13 of Andy Warhol’s Screen Tests were shown to the full-house (and then some) audience, accompanied by the Velvet Underground-like backing music of Dean & Britta. It was a sublime evening all around, complete with a pre-show guided tour of the marvelous Elizabeth Peyton exhibition Live Forever that only furthered the examination into the idea of celebrity and pop culture that would continue on through the Screen Tests.

The Screen Tests are a series of black and white portraits that Warhol did between 1963-66, where the subjects (some famous, some not) were asked to simply pose as Warhol rolled the camera, with each one lasting only as long as a roll of film (roughly just under three minutes). They are all silent films (shown in slow motion so they all last four minutes), so it was a brilliant idea for the Warhol Museum to commission Dean & Britta to provide the soundtrack to these Screen Tests for their first countrywide viewings, adding to the atmosphere and aura of the subjects with music that was carefully chosen by the band to augment the mood created by the subject on-screen.

Dean & Britta were a four-piece for this performance, with Matt Sumrow joining them on keyboards and guitar, and Anthony LaMarca adding drums, bass, acoustic guitar and effects. The first screen test (Richard Rheem) played without the band onstage, with the “Richard Rheem Theme” playing over the speakers as the band strolled onstage and added live layers to their prerecorded instrumental music. Next up was Ann Buchanan, which was a startling, vulnerable Test that subtly showed tears welling up in her eyes, before one or two slowly rolled down her cheek, eventually pooling up on her chin and gradually dropped off. It was a tiny glimpse directly into the anguished soul of the subject, and it was as unsettling as it was riveting, with the delicate soundtrack only adding to the enthralling display.

The songs, all Dean & Britta originals save for two, were extremely well-thought out and cleverly inspired by the stories of the subjects of the Tests. “Teenage Lightning (and Lonely Highways)” was an excellent selection for Paul America, with it’s theme of pill-popping and easy sex. And the lyrics and light mood of “It Don’t Rain In Beverly Hills” only complemented the august beauty of Edie Sedgwick. Seeing her onscreen like this made it easy to fathom how her allure could captivate Andy and everyone in the Factory. I simply couldn’t look away. But staring deep into her eyes, knowing what was to become of her, was really a tragic endeavor. And that certainly was an underlying theme of 13 Most Beautiful…, the dark tragedies that would befall a lot of the subjects, combined with the fact that Warhol’s films captured a fleeting moment in time, where the subjects perhaps would never look this good again, succumbing to age and time just like we all will. This was the dark undercurrent of all the Tests, and was reflected well by the almost sinister soundtrack that Dean & Britta provided for much of the films.

Two of the better known subjects of 13 Most Beautiful… were a very young Dennis Hopper, who actually provided the first smile of any of the Tests, and Lou Reed, who, while graphically drinking a Coca-Cola and mockingly displaying the bottle at Warhol, surely gave Coke the best commercial they never had. The band also fittingly chose to play the hard-driving “Not A Young Man Anymore” by the Velvet Underground while Lou’s amusing Test was shown behind them. It was the highlight of the night for me.

The band also appropriately chose to cover Dylan’s “I’ll Keep It With Mine” for Nico’s lively Screen Test, which Bob apparently wrote for Nico and was featured on her solo debut Chelsea Girl. She actually showed some personality on her test, which was lacking a bit in some of the other subjects who chose to sit stone faced and unmoved in front of the camera, exuding the very essence of cool. Nico played around a bit during her sitting, reading a magazine that she playfully turned into a makeshift telescope that she aimed back at Andy. And again, it was easy to see how her beauty and charm could captivate everyone in the Factory.

Overall, the hour long event was a resounding success, with the captivating Screen Tests of Andy Warhol finally being shown in Minneapolis for the first time, and Dean & Britta providing a potent and fitting soundtrack to the films that really heightened the emotion and feel of the Tests and the intensity of the subjects on display. Dean also added sharp, clever commentary before each film that only added to my level of understanding of the Screen Tests, and showed that he wasn’t just a hired gun, but that he was knowledgeable of not only Warhol’s story, but those of his film’s subjects as well. He was a bit of a tour guide, both musically and verbally, as we were all taken back to the Factory for the night, all of us given a unique glimpse of a moment in time that was all too fleeting.

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