The 10 Best Music Documentary Series Of The Decade

A Netflix production, ReMastered tries to find the sweet spot at the nexus of music documentaries, true crime shows and investigative reporting. Over its eight-episode inaugural season it explored the murders and suspicious deaths of noted musicians, the struggle for recognition for seminal artists and moments when music and the people who made it got caught in the crosshairs of history.

Stream the Remastered collection on Netflix

The 4-episode HBO documentary series The Defiant Ones chronicles the life, friendship and achievements of music’s odd couple; fast-talking New York producer turned executive Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre., sonic architect of West Coast hip hop. Spanning the heyday of classic rock through the epoch of gangsta rap and concluding with the advent of digital music, it’s a fascinating look at two men who changed the music industry from the inside out.

Where to stream The Defiant Ones

Unlike most music docs which profile a particular artist or genre, the loftily titled Soundbreaking: Stories from the Cutting Edge of Recorded Music explores how the history of recording and technology pushed music into uncharted territory. Created by PBS in association with legendary Beatles producer Sir George Martin, the eight-part series traces music history from the first tube amplifiers to to modern laptop studios and how each new breakthrough altered how we make and listen to music.

Where to stream Soundbreaking

Produced by music-loving menswear designer John Varvatos and “Godfather of Punk” Iggy Pop, this four-episode Epix series broke down the history of rock’s most rebellious subgenre. Chronicling four different rock insurgencies, and featuring just about every important punker of note, Punk expertly explains why every generation needs its own musical revolution.

Where to stream Punk

America’s greatest historical documentarian takes a crack at one of America’s great musical forms. Burns brings his storytelling and expository acumen to bear over Country Music‘s eight episodes, creating a vivid narrative of how the often misunderstood genre travelled from rural back roads around the world by telling simple stories of not so simple people.

Where to stream Country Music

Coming off Sound City, his 2013 documentary debut, rock n’ roll renaissance man and Foo Fighter Dave Grohl decided to turn the band’s eighth studio album into an HBO mini-series. Each of Sonic Highways‘ eight songs was recorded in a different U.S. city, as documented in eight episodes, giving Grohl and his bandmates the opportunity to soak in the local flavor and wax poetic about each town’s contribution to American music.

Where to stream Sonic Highways

Part profile of music producer Rick Rubin, part documentary about his historic recording studio in Malibu, California, and part meditation on the creative process, Shangri-La is winsome and informative, both playful and purposeful. Touching on Eastern religions, magic, and professional wrestling, and using a mix of interviews and fantastical reenactments of Rubin’s life, the four-part Showtime series ponders notions of fiction and reality both in and out of the recording booth.

Where to stream Shangri-La

As befitting the most epic hip hop group of all time, Wu-Tang Clan: Of Mics and Men is the Godfather saga of music bio-docs. Journeying back and forth through time, including a robust cast of characters who also happen to be some of the most gifted MCs to ever get on the mic, the four-part Showtime series is a fitting tribute of a group that literally re-wrote the music industry rulebook and hip hop music forever.

Where to stream Wu-Tang Clan: Of Mics and Men

This sprawling 6-part Amazon Prime series presents a portrait of seminal jam band The Grateful Dead so rich in detail, and so engrossing, you’d be hard pressed to cut a minute of it. Not unlike the Wu-Tang doc, Long Strange Trip is a suitably epic tale of an epic band whose contributions to music history span much further than just the music they produced. It also serves as a good primer to unbelievers who wonder why people are still grateful for The Dead.

Where to stream Long Strange Trip

OK, I cheated and picked two series for my number one spot, but they were created by the same people and share the same franchise name, so it seems appropriate. Since 2005’s Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey, Canada’s Banger Films have been responsible for some of the best music documentaries of the new century. Their 2011 VH1 Classic series Metal Evolution approached the headbanging genre with an anthropological thoroughness, not surprising considering filmmaker Sam Dunn’s background as a trained anthropologist. In 2016 they teamed up with Netflix for Hip Hop Evolution, which over the course of three seasons has chronicled the history of the genre with the same attention to detail, not just profiling its biggest stars, but explaining how they came to be and why they matter.

Benjamin H. Smith is a New York based writer, producer and musician.Follow him on Twitter:@BHSmithNYC.

Stream Hip Hop Evolution on Netflix

Where to stream Metal Evolution