When we meet Richie Finestra, the protagonist of the new HBO drama “Vinyl,” his situation is dire. It’s 1973, and this beleaguered record-label executive, played by Bobby Cannavale, has lost faith in the music industry, squandered his sobriety and gotten himself in serious trouble.

Yet when he seems to have hit bottom, Richie glimpses new inspiration not far from the shabby downtown Manhattan intersection where he has gone to buy cocaine: a raucous rock concert at the Mercer Arts Center, being played by an up-and-coming band called New York Dolls.

It is no accident that, from its opening minutes, “Vinyl,” with its mixture of grimy reality, nostalgia for 1970s New York and a throbbing rock ’n’ roll soundtrack, feels like a Martin Scorsese movie. Mr. Scorsese, the Academy Award-winning filmmaker, is an executive producer of the series and directed its two-hour pilot episode.

Should that pedigree feel insufficient for a narrative about bad behavior, existential crises and the redemptive power of music, Mr. Scorsese is joined on “Vinyl” by Mick Jagger, the lead singer of the Rolling Stones and a fellow executive producer on the series, which has its debut on Feb. 14.