Singer Joe Lesté does not like ending to Bang Tango movie documentary

Singer Joe Lesté does not like ending to Bang Tango movie documentary

Bang Tango‘s long-time frontman Joe Lesté was recently interviewed by LA Weekly and commented on the movie documentary on his band entitled Attack Of Life: The Bang Tango Movie, which was created, produced and edited (over four years) by Drew Fortier and who later on went on to join the group as its second guitarist.

Excerpts from LA Weekly‘s interview with Lesté states:

“In 2015, a feature-length Bang Tango documentary, Attack of Life, was released to little fanfare. It’s now available to watch on YouTube. The film tells the predictable tale of a band with a cult following that didn’t shift enough units and eventually imploded, before resurfacing with Leste and a revolving lineup of musicians. The singer does not like the film but, weirdly enough, director Drew Fortier joined Bang Tango as second guitarist shortly after its completion.

“Back in my drinking days I made a lot of stupid mistakes, one of which was letting Drew do that movie,” he says. “Drew’s a good friend of mine, I don’t have anything bad to say about him. But the whole thing ends with us at an empty arena. It’s like, ‘Thanks, Drew.’ Bang Tango played great shows after that but he didn’t have that on there. Most of the guys in the band were very let down by it. Some people complemented it. I guess it’s very self-deprecating.”

On Friday, Bang Tango plays the Whisky a Go-Go, one of the band’s old haunts. (Though Fortier is still a member of the band, says Leste, he won’t be appearing at this show.) In fact, Bang Tango was signed after a showcase at the Whisky back in the day. Clearly, it’s a room filled with great memories, a special venue for a man happy to have any sort of legacy at all.”

You can read the rest of the interview with Lesté at LA Weekly.

Sleaze Roxx stated the following in its review of the documentary Attack Of Life: The Bang Tango Movie: “So really, what you have at the end of the day with the Attack Of Life: The Bang Tango Movie is a straight up chronological view of Bang Tango and the ups and seemingly more downs that the band has gone through. Being admittedly not that familiar with Bang Tango or even into their music, I found the documentary to be interesting, intriguing and certainly very informative on the band’s journey to where it’s at. It would have been nice to get some more insight on Bang Tango from Lesté himself but the mercurial frontman was not an open book for the documentary with his tendency to pass on discussing certain more controversial topics throughout the film. The real voice of reason in the Bang Tango film turns out to be former guitarist Mark Knight whose interviews are featured consistently throughout the documentary and who comments on virtually all aspects of the group despite not being in the band since really 1995.”

In January 2016, Fortier ended up releasing the documentary Attack Of Life: The Bang Tango Movie for viewing free of charge on YouTube:

Attack of Life: The Bang Tango Movie (2015)

4 long soul crushing years went into making this documentary. It was 100% a work of passion straight from the heart. I am finally at peace with knowing that …