Attica Blues, The Sound Before The Fury

In 1972, a year after the infamous Attica Prison Uprising in New York state, saxophonist Archie Shepp released "Attica Blues," an ambitious and deeply-moving avant-garde album mixing blues, Gospel, R&B, and soul. Forty years later, Shepp—who had by-then developed into one of the leading figures of the free jazz scene—revived the work, assembling a new crop of young musicians for an artistic retreat in the South of France. This documentary follows the group from through the rehearsal process to the performance at the 2014 edition of the Jazz à la Villette festival, juxtaposing contemporary footage with archival images of Attica itself, as well as extensive interviews with Shepp exploring the aesthetic and political elements of the piece.