You know I’m a sucker for a medley.

And I was in luck when I caught Accidental Charm’s show at the Music Cafe in Damascus, Md. It’s a charming place, if a bit of a haul — especially in a downpour like this Friday night.

The evening was a mix of originals and covers, the originals being delightfully poppy and the covers being surprisingly diverse. Each of the four guys sing, which is rare, and rarer still the harmonies are sweet. The band dared a cover of CSN’s “Carry On” and it sounded better than the originals have managed to perform it since about 1974.

The band also dared to perform a couple medleys, not always the “cool” choice. But it worked this night. For instance, the group’s instrumental “See-Ya-Later-Bye,” is snappy enough, but then it segued into an extended and utterly unexpected medley — including several tunes so unexpected that I can’t recall them now. But part of the medley was a song I never expected to hear live: the Albert Hammond soft-rock anthem “It Never Rains In Southern California.” So random. And then it was back into “See Ya Later,” then into “Live & Let Die,” a bit of “Bohemian Rhapsody,” and finally Cheap Trick’s “Dream Police,” before finishing with the instrumental. A bravura performance. Jolly.

The group is Tom Godsman (guitar,vocals), Rob Isele (guitar, keyboards, vocals), Jack Albert (bass, guitar, vocals), and Brad Davis (drums, vocals). Sadly, this was probably Rob’s last show with the band. He’s concentrating all his musical efforts on his money-making Beach Boys tribute band, Still Surfin’. While we wish him success, we must insist that Accidental Charm not break up. America demands good pop bands. (It’s all we have left.)

Here’s “It Never Rains,” in case you had banished it from your ears. (Later, the band also played a straight-faced cover of “Treat Her Like a Lady” by Cornelius Brothers & Sister Rose. Don’t hear that very often, either. Here’s the group’s own video of the song, which is much better than my guerilla clip.)

UPDATE/CORRECTION: Tom Godsman writes in to point out that the medley “was actually part of ‘Who Made the Rules?,’ but I think we played it pretty close in the set list to ‘See-ya-later-bye,’ so it’s an honest mistake.” We honestly regret the error.

Went to see the British Walkers reunion at Winston Billiards Cafe in Rockville on Saturday. For those who missed the British Walkers phenomenon the first time around in 1965 — and I missed them, too — they were a D.C.-area band that wore Redcoat-style outfits, spoke with British accents, and played Beatle songs, Beatle-type songs, and generally did a bang-up job of cashing in on the whole Beatle thing. Though I never witnessed the magic first-hand, I’d heard the band name and that of its charismatic leader Bobbie Howard whispered reverently often enough over the years. After all, Roy Buchanan was the band’s first guitarist.

So I don’t know what I was expecting — perhaps the Redcoat suits? At the least, I was hoping for some Beatle-y teen-club nostalgia.

What I got was the worst double-bill since Hendrix opened for the Monkees.

For some reason, Joe Lee, mastermind of the event, booked an opening act, the Mustangs, an 11-piece soul band, complete with horn section and four lead singers. Some of the group were part of Wilson Pickett’s last band. And, damn. They totally rocked the joint. Opening with a Sly & the Family Stone medley, the group perfectly captured the Staple Singers, Etta James, and James Brown, and gave the terms “bar band” and “cover band” a bright sheen of respect.

The crowd — not surprisingly, mostly aging white folks — screamed for an encore, which the Mustangs were happy to play.

The only way the Walkers could have followed that was if they were the actual Beatles. And even then, I’m not sure.

It did not help that after the Mustangs cleared the stage there followed an interminable amount of tuning up and microphone feedback. Hello, sound engineer: you just had 11 musicians onstage, now you’ve got five. Remove six mics and don’t screw with anything else. Hello, band: Tune up offstage. They make portable tuners for just this purpose. Buy some.

Howard is now 67 and he still has the mod hair and looks sharp in a Carnaby Street suit. But, unlike the stylishly-attired Mustangs, the other Walkers opted for a mishmash of jeans, ball-caps, and whatever Elvis-meets-David Byrne outfit Billy Hancock was wearing.

And what was Hancock doing onstage anyway? He was never a member of the band. Though everyone else onstage had, at one time, been a member of the British Walkers, this particular lineup never existed. Guitarist Geoff Richardson never played with Bobbie, according to Hancock’s liner notes to the reissue CD. (OK, that might explain why he was there.)

The band started with a cover of Sam Cooke’s “Shake,” also one of its local-but-not-quite-national hits. And right away it seemed that the British Invasion legend was more myth than reality. As Joe Lee told the Post’s John Kelly, “The band was as much a rhythm-and-blues group as a rock group….They looked like a bunch of guys from England, but they listened to all the same soul stations as I did in the ’60s.”

Howard said after the third song (”Knock on Wood”) that his voice couldn’t handle an entire night of singing anymore and introduced Hancock, who launched into one of his usual rockabilly songs. And I felt whatever good will I’d come with evaporate. I can see the Billy Hancock show any time. Plus, I just felt embarrassed for the band.

I left while Kelly, the nicest man alive, frugged valiantly on the dance floor, doing his part, at least, to keep that ’60s magic alive.

You be the judge: Here’s the British Walkers, followed by the Mustangs.

One might not expect any connection between the coarsely hysterical comedy The Hangover — currently No. 1 at the box-office — and documentaries. But in fact Hangover director Todd Phillips began in the doc world, first with the 1994 G.G. Allin film Hated, then with Frat House.

Here he talks with critic Elvis Mitchell on the KCRW show The Treatment about how making documentaries “is like living life on fast-forward,” his love of the Maysles brothers, and how Maysles and Wiseman-style “fly-on-the-wall” filmmaking “went out the window” in the modern era after people were conditioned by reality and entertainment news shows to “fear the camera.”

I also suggest you subscribe to The Treatment podcast, as Mitchell is terrific at getting great interviews from a wide range of people in the arts. And if you wish to contribute to KCRW, go here. (If you want to contribute to me, go here. Thank you.)

Todd Phillips on documentaries (3:29)

The list of the 122 films that screened during Silverdocs week. I need some sleep…

Having just finished reading Spy: The Funny Years, I was perhaps primed to make this connection. Also, I kept running into John Hanshaw, founder of the Washington Film Institute and Guerilla Film Festival. That’s John on the left and Cat Ladies director Christie Callan-Jones on the right. I swear, in person the resemblance is quite pronounced.

Well, almost a wrap. I still haven’t posted my notes on the Distribution panel, but will soon. Also coming is shocking video of the brutal beard contest following the screening of Splitting Hairs, as well as an arty video farewell. But here’s some semi-final thoughts.

WHAT I LOVED: Loved the Hub. The Music Master Class was fabulous, as was Sam Pollard’s editing seminar. Also, Cat Ladies, Winnebago Man, Best Worst Movie, though I didn’t get around to writing about it, Splitting Hairs, Carmen Meets Borat, and of course, the best movie ever made, Supermen of Malegaon.

And the opening night party was pretty drinktacular, what I remember.

WHAT I DIDN’T LOVE: The Future of Public Media panel was a bit too clever for its own good.

WHAT I DIDN’T GET: I stopped by Third Coast International Audio Festival late and caught the end of a This American Life piece that I’d already heard and the begining of another that I think I’d already heard. So, any criticism is likely half-baked. But one reason I left early was that after several days at an event with so much dazzling eyeball stimulation, I wasn’t in a mood to sit in the dark and just — listen. For one thing, the experience just seemed too…dark. Strange, I know. But as much as I love audio and radio, I’m not sure this feature fits that well with a film festival. But I’m prepared to be proven wrong next year.

A perhaps too-late nod to other coverage of Silverdocs. David Wilson at indieWire offered 9 Great Silverdocs Moments, after gushing about Artistic Director Sky Sitney, writing that “any additional responsibilities seem only to have spurred Sitney to greater triumphs, as the fest put forth what was arguably its strongest lineup of films ever, and further cemented its position as one of the most important gathering spots for the US documentary industry.”

Well, OK. Wilson also referred to downtown Silver Spring as a “bizarro downtown mall,” which we’re not entirely clear on. But he agreed with us about Supermen of Malegaon, calling it “sublime.”

Cineuropa says that “for European documentaries, the Silverdocs Documentary Film Festival is a springboard for recognition.”

Other blogs of note with Silverdocs mentions (and worth following in general): AJ Schnack’s All These Wonderful Things. Schnack, of course, is the director of Convention, which featured prominently at this year’s event.

Also, check out Pamela Cohn’s Still In Motion blog, as well as Filmmaker Magazine’s blog, to which she contributes.

Ted Hope’s Truly Free Film is full of provocation and insight. Hope is the producer of the recent indie darling, Adventureland. Most recent posts include the timely Preparing for a Film Festival and Festival Goals.

And, of course, Scott Kirsner’s CinemaTech blog is indespensible.

Following up on Mercedes Stalenhoef’s Carmen Meets Borat here’s Jeff Schaffer, a writer on Borat and now the already-controversial Bruno, explaining, somewhat, the thought process behind creating Sacha Baron Cohen’s style of confrontational comedy.

Ick. “Doccie”? Scratch that. Maybe Silverdocs doesn’t need a catchy award nickname. The doc crowd is far too earnest for such Hollywood-style hokum, anyway. Perhaps. But anything to spread the word about some of these films would be a good thing. Especially in this economy, awards can be a critical factor in whether a film gets a theatrical release, or even a DVD distribution deal. Even a producer of a sure-fire crowd-pleaser was fretting to me about the current distribution climate.

A frustration for the audience is where to find many of these intriguing films after Silverdocs. Outside of piracy, it’s unclear. I offer links to film Web sites, where available.

Anyway, Silverdocs announced its award winners for the 2009 festival. Here are some highlights from Saturday’s presentation; the full list is below.

The top award was given to a film that hadn’t even screened yet. October Country took the Sterling US Feature Award. Co-director Michael Palmieri looked stunned, or perhaps just jet-lagged, as he exclaimed, “We just got off the plane!” He then raised the award statuette overhead and cried, “Sno-Globe!” (It does look like a sno-globe.) “And a check!” ($10,000, in fact.) Palmieri thanked Sky Sitney for putting on a great event, noting that “there’s no science to running a festival, you just do it.” He added “how good it feels to be with filmmakers” (applause), then ceded the podium to filmmaking partner Donal Mosher, whose family is the film’s subject. Mosher was visibly moved as he accepted the globe.

12 Notes Down which documents a 14-year old choir performer whose voice is changing, won both the Audience Award and the Sterling Short Award. Filmmaker Andreas Koefoed, himself a former choirboy, explained that he only graduated from Danish film school last week. He quietly wondered if this would help him earn a living in documentaries.

Perhaps he should talk with Lucy Bailey, whose Mugabe and the White African took the Sterling World Feature Award. “The film has drained us financially and emotionally, and continues to do so,” she said.

Brendan Canty and Peter Gabriel’s daughter were among the judges who voted Riseup the best music documentary. Luciano Blotta’s film is about Jamaica’s electric underground reggae scene. Blotta is another of the many first-time directors this year. He had gone to Jamaica to visit a friend and — again like many others — stumbled upon his subject. A veteran of fiction films, Blotta called docs “the best medium to be working in,” adding “nothing is more gratifying and harder than documentaries.” He then declared that he will “never work in narrative again.” Big cheers from the crowd on that.

Finally, Blotta offered a dismissal to Hollywood and a rallying cry for all documentarians: “The best stories and best characters are already out there. We just have to find them.”

• Sterling US Feature Award: October Country
• Sterling World Feature Award: Mugabe and the White African
• Sterling Short Award: 12 Notes Down
• Special Jury Mention: Salt
• Music Documentary Award: Riseup
• Special Jury Mention: Soul Power (”Best James Brown footage,” said Canty.)
• Cinematic Vision Award: Old Partner
• The WITNESS Award: Good Fortune
• Writers Guild of America Documentary Screenplay Award: Off and Running
• ACE Grant Winner: Cinema Chimp
• Feature Audience Award: The Cove (I’ve been told this is coming to E Street Cinemas later this year.)
• Short Audience Award: 12 Notes Down

So, how many did you see? Do you agree? And what’s Luciano Blotta gonna do with that shiny red Gibson guitar that he also won?

As we all know, Hollywood destroys America every week. But one movie also wreaked havoc in the tiny, obscure Romanian town of Glod. Sacha Baron Cohen used the place (whose name aptly translates as “mud”) as a stand-in for Kazakhstan in Borat: Cultural Learnings, etc., etc., and notably depicted its residents as whores, thieves, and rapists.

By chance, filmmaker Mercedes Stalenhoef was on holiday in Romania before the Borat crew arrived, and had been documenting the life of a charismatic 17-year-old girl with dreams of escaping to the good life in Spain. When Stalenhoef returned, post-Borat, it was to a pissed-off town, about to be pissed on again — this time by unbelievably insufferable American lawyers, who dangled empty promises of fortunes to be had by suing 20th Century Fox.

Carmen Meets Borat is both a fascinating portrait of Gypsy (or Roma, if you prefer) life on the edges and also manages to turn the image of comedian Cohen in his Borat costume into a villainous figure, up there with Lex Luthor and Montgomery Burns.

I sat down with Stalenhoef at her hotel for a chat about her film and how chance is the documentarian’s constant companion.