Devo rejected hippie escapism as well as the ungrounded aggression of punk — “We knew why we were angry. We knew who we were angry with” — to criticize technology, social conformity and dumbed-down consumer culture. The band’s name alludes to “devolution,” a concept born from the idea that the band felt everything and everyone in America was becoming stupider and uglier as the country descended into the Reagan-era.

While the band’s modus operandi is familiar to fans, even many Devo loyalists don’t know the full details of Devo’s origin story: Mothersbaugh and fellow Devo co-founders Gerald Casale and Bob Lewis were all attending Kent State University in 1970 when the Ohio National Guard opened-fire on unarmed student anti-war protesters killing four and wounding nine. It was a catalyzing event for the band and one that proved their then-nascent idea that idiocy found its reflection in art in the form of a kind of spastic tragedy.

Are We Not Men is an in-production documentary of the band that’s got fans waiting on pins and needles. While I prefer to post full films/docs/shows here, this fat clip from the upcoming movie offers an illuminating glimpse at how the lighting-flash-horror of the Kent State shootings brought Devo yelping and jerking to life. The video also includes the band’s jaw-dropping debut on SNL…

Devo Documentary Kent State from Tony Pemberton on Vimeo.

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