Love in Bright Landscapes: The Story of David McComb of the Triffids is a feature-length documentary, depicting the life and times of late Australian songwriter David McComb (February 17, 1962 – February 2, 1999) best known for his work with the Triffids, a band he co-founded in Perth, Western Australia. The Triffids were active between 1978 and 1990.
The film was the directorial debut of Melbourne-based writer/broadcaster Jonathan Alley, who also wrote the documentary screenplay. The film was produced by Atticus Media and The Acme Film Company and distributed in the Australian/New Zealand territory by Label Distribution.
The title Love in Bright Landscapes refers both to the Triffids’ compilation of the same name, released in 1986, and the poem by Spanish literary figure Rafael Alberti, who published The Coming Back of Love in Bright Landscapes] in 1973.[1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_in_Bright_Landscapes:_The_Story_of_David_McComb_of_the_Triffids
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I had watched Great Australian Albums episode on Born Sandy Devotional and listened to Kirsten Krauth’s Almost a Mirror episode on ‘Wide Open Road’, so I was aware of The Triffids story. However, what Jonathan Alley brought to the table with were some of the voices closest to David McComb. What was weird though about this was that by the time this documentary was released in 2021, how many of these voices were long past, a point made by Alley in the credits.
One aspect that I felt Alley made more light of was McComb’s life after ‘Born Sand Devotional’. I had not realised that the record company wanted to seemingly replace the band in the recording process for Calenture, their Island Records debut. It makes you wonder in this circumstance where David McComb stops and the band begins, a similar experience I had reading Love & Pain by Ben Gillies and Chris Joannou.
Another interesting aspect to this sort of documentary are the voices that are included and the subsequent ones that are excluded. For example, Bleddyn Butcher is not a part of the discussion. Maybe as he has his own book Save What You Can, then he did not feel the need to be involved or was not asked?