Mutton-chopped Jesse Hector was a permanent fixture in the English music press of the mid-‘70s and the electrifying live performances of his band The Gorillas proved an inspiration to such faces of the burgeoning punk scene as Paul Weller, Billy Idol, Shane McGowan and Rat Scabies.
Jesse has always believed in the revolutionary and rejuvenating power of music - the cover of The Gorillas album showed his band of space age Mods hurtling towards earth on a meteorite to save the world with rock n' roll - and his belief in music is as strong today as it ever has been.
He now works as a cleaner at Hackney Empire and The Royal
Horticultural Society and this documentary follows him as he journeys around London and retraces his fifty years in rock n' roll - skiffling at the 2 I's in Old Compton Street at the age of 12, playing guitar with Mod Freak beat legends The Clique, fronting proto-punk bruisers Crushed Butler and The Hammersmith Gorillas - and attempts to find out, as the NME's Roy Carr wrote in 1977, ‘Whatever Happened To Jesse Hector?'
'A Message To The World' documentary is being shown at the Raindance festival on October 4th at 12.00 pm:
http://www.raindance.co.uk/site/index.php?id=301,2754,0,0,1,0
It is also being shown the following Tuesday October 7th as part of the Pop Mavericks season at the Barbican:
http://www.barbican.org.uk/film/event-detail.asp?ID=7911
