Last week was the US premiere of Wild Combination: A Portrait of Russell, a feature-length documentary on the avant-garde composer and disco powerhouse. It’s a project that I first heard about probably a year and a half ago, and having to wait that long to finally see the film set it up for nothing short of disappointment. Thankfully, it did more than exceed any of my incoming expectations.

For as much as I love Arthur Russell, I had never seen, apart from a few brief clips in the trailer for Wild Combination, him perform live. Nor had I seen any pictures outside of those readily available in each of his releases. Info is scarce, and besides the basic biographical stuff, I really knew nothing about the guy. And, well, info is still scarce, but far less scarce than it used to be. The thing was chock full of images, live performances, and just about anything that an obsessive like myself would freak out over.

The major highlights, for me at least, were the clips of Arthur playing live, running from early folk (I had no idea he even played the guitar!) straight through to the World of Echo drone business. Also, his parents and boyfriend were unbelievably charming and made for great interviews, and without their quirky antidotes and clear love for the man this film would have probably been lacking.

The documentary also didn’t really fall into any of the traps of “misunderstood genius” or “ahead of his time” (well, maybe a little on the latter) that plague most rock-docs. Instead, this was more of a friendly portrait, a love-letter to a guy whose life ambition was to make music. Perfect he wasn’t, but rather than dwell on any negatives, the thing felt more like a fond farewell and instead chose to celebrate Arthur’s life for what it was, and completely succeeded.

Also, in what is about the best news I’ve heard (straight from the director’s mouth), Audika is planning on doing a new installment in their reissue series later this year, this time featuring a bunch of folk and acoustic guitar tracks from the earlier part of Arthur’s life. The film featured a few of these unreleased cuts, which were haunting, sublime, and gorgeous, all at once.