THE BASS OF WOMEN
"The Bass of Women" is a documentary about the Sound System scene in Barcelona from a feminist perspective: where are the women of the scene?
​
I came into the project with the aim to help a friend who wanted a second opinion on the first cut of the documentary. I started giving some feedback on the editing, but the more I knew about it, the more I thought everybody had to know about it. I didn't know much, or anything, about the Sound System and I was learning a lot from the project, but specially, the message it carried out is essential. So I started taking the role of Producer, maybe without noticing.
​
There were still some interviews to be done, we needed music rights (at the end, is a documentary about a music scene), we still had to face color correction and sound design... I managed a crowdfunding campaign which was very successful and helped us to get to a lot of people. Also, I started and controlled with a colleague an Instagram account in which we started presenting the amazing (women) artists involved in it, and giving some sneak-picks of the documentary. What kept us going was the warm feedback we received since the first minute. People and collectives from scene, and from around the world, wrote to us agreeing in the importance of the message, asking to do a screening or just giving thanks for sharing the message.
Small bio of the artists and a short video of their participation in the documentary.
Sections of our Instagram page. Pictures by Marta Vilardell.
In September 2019 we screened it for the first time in the In-Edit Festival in Barcelona, a film festival about projects related to music. For us it meant so much, not only for being recognised by an important film festival, but because is where the project was born. Two years before the director had seen there a documentary about the Sound System scene in Barcelona, in which, for one hour and a half, no women appeared in it, not even in the background. Was that a real portrait of the Sound System panorama in Barcelona? No, it definitely wasn't.
​
We invited a few of the artists of the documentary to play in the opening of the festival, and it's something that we have continued on doing on other screenings. As this documentary wants to put them in the front page.
​
We organised another screening and party in the famous Sala Apolo of Barcelona. We had the motivation of doing a private screening for the people who helped us in the crowdfunding campaign, but it became a bigger night than we expected. It was a great moment to celebrate the union we had created, to share our happiness and passion for music and the scene, and to honour the artists behind it that make it possible.
​
​
The documentary has had a long run around many important festivals (Festival Internacional de Málaga, Barciff, Reteena...), but what gives us an important motivation is when we receive those message on Instagram and the many screenings that independent collectives have asked us for. We are glad that we were able to expand an important message in the scene, but also, important in so many other areas.