BE FOREWARNED: Last Days Here is a devastating gaze into the void for Pentagram singer Bobby Liebling

– Kier-La Janisse

—————————-

I still remember the first time I heard Pentagram – it was third on a mixed CD given to me by a friend with a smack habit, curiously nestled between the soothing sounds of Marmalade’s ‘Reflections of my Life’ and ‘Flight of the Ibis’ by McDonald and Giles. It was ‘Be Forewarned’, and it was the most evil and desperate promise of obsessive vengeance I’d ever heard. There was a craziness to the singer’s voice that reminded me of Roky Erickson or Sir Lord Baltimore, a mathematically confusing online levitra us bass solo, and a hallucinatory echo that seemed epic and insular at the same time.

A few years ago at Fantasia, John Carchietta of the Media Blasters crew was in town for the fest, and we struck up a conversation about Bobby Liebling of Pentagram – an enormously talented singer who – so John told me – was now living in his parents’ basement in Maryland struggling with some manner of drug addiction or mental buy cialis online canada illness or both. When John Srebalus’ doom rock doc Such Hawks Such Hounds came out in 2008, Liebling’s voice was conspicuously absent, although original Pentagram drummer Geof O’Keefe shared stories about how Bobby’s antics had cost them a serious record deal in the 70s (this was more to do with perfectionism in the studio than drug abuse, which would come later). The band went through a number of personnel changes over the succeeding years with Bobby being the only consistent member. With a smattering of public appearances throughout the 90s and 00s that – more often than not – end in disaster, Liebling has spent the viagra professional scam last 20 years holed up with a crack pipe and digging at self-inflicted gaping wounds, while nursing delusions of a comeback.

Pellet

Enter Sean “Pellet” Pelletier, a fan who decided to take his love for the band to the next level by a) re-releasing their early recordings (his compilation First Daze Here is the way most music nerds heard about Pentagram for the first time) and b) helping Bobby get his shit together so that he could have one last shot at getting it right.

Don Argott and Demian Fenton (The Art of the Steal – if you haven’t seen it, make sure you do) were there to film what happened, and the results are shocking, horrifying, tear-jerking and kind of magical. Don Argott spoke to Spectacular Optical about the process .

——————–

How long have you been working on this film, and what was your introduction to the subject matter?  I know John Carchietta  peripherally and since he was one of the cameramen I first heard of the film being made maybe 2 or 3 years ago.

The film took about four years from the start of filming to the final edit. Demian had met Pellet at a metal show and began talking about Bobby and Pentagram. The initial idea was that Pellet was trying to get Bobby to record one last Pentagram album, and we thought that would be a great backdrop for the doc. We decided to go down to Germantown and meet Bobby and shoot some footage. In fact, the first scene in the film is from that initial visit. We decided to continue shooting, all the while not really sure if there was ever going to be a film at the end.

How well known was Pentagram regionally before Sean Pelletier released the First Daze Here compilation? Of course everyone now claims they’ve heard about Pentagram forever but I doubt that’s true!

They had a respectable following in the underground metal scene, especially the Maryland doom scene. Hank III, Phil Anselmo and Jimmy Bower from Down were huge fans. I think the release of First Daze Here and First Days Here Too really helped get their music out to many more people. Now, the Dead Weather cover “Forever my Queen” and you see a lot more Pentagram shirts. The early 70s stuff is really exceptional music I think, and I’m surprised they were pretty much unknown for as long as they were.

The film is extremely harsh at times – you are right into the void of crack addiction within seconds. Was there any deliberation as to whether or not you wanted to show Bobby actually smoking crack in the film?

There wasn’t much deliberation about it. The reality is, that’s who Bobby is, it was a huge part of his life, and really, a huge part of the obstacles he had to overcome. If you’re making a film about a drunk, you’d expect to see the main character drinking. As harsh and depressing as it is to see, I think it’s imperative to experience the heartbreak by seeing what he has to go through.

Was there any worry that your depiction of Bobby was exploitive, or would you have thought so if the story had a different ending?

I think we were conscious of it. There really is a fine line between reality and exploitation, how much is too much, what do you need to see versus what crosses that line. I think the choices we made were appropriate for the story we were trying to tell.

Did you feel like the people around him were enablers?

I think Joe, Bobby’s dad, says it best when we ask him the same question. If they give up on him and kick him out on the streets, chances are he’s dead. If it’s your son or daughter, what do you do? It’s easy when it’s not your decision. They made the choice and some people could call them enablers, but that’s not for me to judge.

During filming did you think there was any way Bobby was going to get it together? Or did you think you were going to be making a film about the last days of a tragic talent?

That’s why it took so long! We honestly didn’t know and we were really along for the ride no matter what. There were many times throughout this process where we honestly didn’t know if this was going to turn into anything. In the end, I’m glad we stuck with it.

His physical state, the gashes on his arms are horrifying – it seemed vague as to what kind of medical attention these wounds were getting. Were they being properly treated?

As a drug addict who has legitimate health problems, bouncing in and out of hospital emergency rooms, it’s tough. The doctors see him, they know what’s up, and I’m not saying that he got poor care, but the reality of our healthcare system with someone like Bobby, chances are he’s not getting the top doctors in the land working on his medical needs.

Why do you think Pellet sticks with Bobby? It seems like he’s waiting for something to ‘pan out’, but just putting that pentagram album out was hugely influential, and he doesn’t seem to recognize that.

Yeah, we talked with Pellet quite a bit, more as a friend, about that. Like I said before, it’s easy form an outsider’s perspective to say just give up and walk away, but I understand why he stuck with it, even when I personally felt he should have gotten out. I think in a way, the music is Pellet’s addiction and as much as he knows this situation is unhealthy for him, he’s still willing to stick with it because he just can’t give up.

Actually the parallel between Sean and Bobby is interesting in that Bobby places all his stock in Halley and Pellet places all of his in Bobby, and all of their self-worth seems to be based on whether or not their relationship with these people reach their ‘goals’.

That’s right. The irony is, if Bobby had just focused on the music to begin with, ,which is all Pellet wanted him to do, we might not have had much of a film!

Where did the 70s footage of them come from, as well as the backyard horror movie they made? Any chance of putting the horror film on the  eventual DVD as an extra?

Most of that footage is re-creations that we shot on Super-8, but the horror movie is from the original drummer Geof O’Keefe. He has an amazing archive of Pentagram materials. Not sure about DVD extras at the moment, but there will be plenty of deleted scenes.

I could relate to Pellet a lot because I have also spent a lot of time and money promoting the careers of indie musicians I like, to their apparent indifference.  Is there a right way to love your heroes?

Pellet says it in the film: “Music is a powerful drug”. Music, maybe more than film, is just very sacred to people and for some it becomes all-consuming. Pellet has directly impacted Bobby’s life, and both are better for it. It comes down to the things that drive us, and Pellet was fortunate enough to really become involved in helping one of his musical heroes, that’s a beautiful thing.

———————

LAST DAYS HERE has its Canadian Premiere on Sunday July 31 at 7:30pm and screens again Aug 2 at 3:15pm, both in the Salle JA DeSeve. More info on the film page HERE.

About the author:

Kier-La Janisse

Kier-La Janisse is a film writer, publisher, producer, acquisitions executive for Severin Films and an Adjunct Associate Professor in the School of Communication and Creative Arts at Deakin University. She is the author of Cockfight: A Fable of Failure (2024), House of Psychotic Women: An Autobiographical Topography of Female Neurosis in Horror and Exploitation Films (2012/2022) and A Violent Professional: The Films of Luciano Rossi (2007) and has been an editor on numerous books including Warped & Faded: Weird Wednesday and the Birth of the American Genre Film Archive (2021) and Satanic Panic: Pop-Cultural Paranoia in the 1980s (2015). She wrote, directed and produced the award-winning documentary Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched: A History of Folk Horror (2021), and produced the acclaimed blu-ray box sets All the Haunts Be Ours: A Compendium of Folk Horror (2021) and The Sensual World of Black Emanuelle (2023).