Bjork: Volumen

• Cat.no: BJORK 502DVD
• Cert: E
• Running time: 64 minutes
• Year: 1999
• Pressing: 1999
• Region(s): 0, 2 (UK PAL)
• Chapters: 15
• Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0 (Dolby Surround)
• Languages: English
• Lyrics: None
• Aspect ratio varies from song to song
• 16:9-enhanced: No
• Macrovision: No
• Disc Format: DVD 5
• Price: £16.99
• Extras : Animated scene index

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Directors:

Michel Gondry

(Human Behaviour, Army Of Me, Isobel, Hyperballad, Joga, Bachelorette)
Sophie Muller (Venus as a Boy, Possibly Maybe)
Danny Cannon (Play Dead)
Stephane Sednaoui (Big Time Sensuality (Fluke Re-Mix))
Jean-Baptiste Mondino (Violently Happy)
Spike Jonze (It’s Oh So Quiet)
John Kricfalusi (I Miss You)
Paul White (Hunter)

Volumenis the first compilation of music videos by Bjork who came to the fore in theUK as singer of The Sugarcubes, when the single Hit became just that,making No.17 in January 1992, although they had released previous singles from theirfirst album, Life’s Too Good, in 1987 and early 88: Cold Sweat, Deusand the classic Birthday, re-mixed and re-released in October 1992, a songabout a girl who kept a spider in her pocket. None of the early Sugarcubes recordsmade a big impression on the main pop chart, although the band were always regularfavourites in the Indie Chart on ITV’s The Chart Show. From her early daysin the pop world it’s clear that Bjork’s was anything other than commercial, buther music is certainly striking and grabs the attention and this is reflectedin the promos.

Her first album, Debut, spawned the hits Human Behaviour (No.36,June 93), her Top 40 solo debut, Venus as a Boy (No.29, Sep 93), whichwas later used in Luc Besson’s 1994 French hitman thriller Leon, PlayDead (No.12, Oct 93), recorded and mixed by David Arnold for Danny Cannon’sBritish thriller The Young Americans starring Harvey Keitel and KeithAllen, the song for which didn’t appear on the first issue of Debut just there-issue, Big Time Sensuality (No.17, Dec 93), a re-mix of which is usedhere and Violently Happy (No.13, Mar 94).

The second album, Post, was an even bigger success kicking off with theequally bizarre Army of Me (No.10, May 95) and when you watch this videoit makes you wonder what goes on in her mind on a regular basis, Isobel(No.23, Aug 95), placing Bjork in ballad-country and a cover version ofIt’s Oh So Quiet giving Bjork her biggest hit to date (No.4, Nov 95) witha very colourful video accompanying the song.

The following year saw the release of the ambient Hyperballad (No.8, Feb 96)and a 12″-only release for Possibly Maybe (No.13, Nov 96), a very slow songwhich seemed a little sparse on first hearings but soon grew on me and was releasedas part of a remix album, Telegram, later the same month.

Last year she released Homogenic which went into the album charts at No.4but the singles taken from it strayed outside the mainstream and didn’t get muchairplay. I Miss You (No.36, Mar 97) features a cartoon Bjork and some cleveruse of animation and was followed by the brilliant ballad Joga (Sep 97), ofwhich I don’t have a chart position but it failed to make the Top 40.Bachelorette (No.21, Dec 97) is a haunting song which lingers in the mind.Hunter (1998) is the final track on the compilation which didn’t make the Top 40either, despite having an interesting video directed by Paul White with CGI effectsplaced on top of Bjork’s bald head making her look like one of the bears in theCoca Cola advert.

The picture quality is mostly perfect with only a few artifacts appearing on darkblue backgrounds at times during Human Behaviour, Play Dead and It’s OhSo Quiet. Most of the videos play in 4:3 although Play Dead, It’s Oh SoQuiet, Possibly Maybe and Hunter were shot at a wider ratio between 15:9and 16:9 depending on the track.

The average bitrate is a very good 6.15Mb/s, regularly peaking over 7Mb/sbut occasionally dropping briefly for the few seconds when each track begins as thetitle is displayed and the bitrate need not be high at that time to provide a goodpicture. The disc is not 16:9-enhanced for widescreen televisions as most of thesongs are in 4:3. It would have been nice to see the widescreen videos presented inanamorphic format, but they still fare very well. Most of the rest can easily bezoomed into 14:9 or 16:9 on a widescreen TV with little or no detrimental effect.

The sound quality is superb with every song bristling crisp and clear in stereoand/or surround sound. No more to say on this part other than it’s faultless.

There are 15 chapters, one for each song plus the end credits and the full track listing is as follows :

1. Human Behaviour
2. Venus as a Boy
3. Play Dead
4. Big Time Sensuality (Fluke Re-Mix)
5. Violently Happy
6. Army of Me
7. Isobel
8. It’s Oh So Quiet
9. Hyperballad
10. Possibly Maybe
11. I Miss You
12. Joga
13. Bachelorette
14. Hunter
15. End credits

Languages & Lyrics :

All of the songs are sung in English but there are no lyrics which would have been auseful addition as there’s many a time when I can’t understand what Bjork is on about,even when the vocals are clear.

Menu :

The animated menu contains clips of her promo videos and is easily navigated by the useof some strange symbols which can only be described as ducks.

On inserting the disc, you see the copyright info, a One Little Indian Records logo,the Volumen logo and finally the menu, from which you can select individual tracks orthe whole lot from start to finish.

Overall, music videos can tend to get overlooked when it comes to making themavailable on DVD compared to the number of films available and there’s few moreartists than Bjork making such visually-stunning images which are worthy of yourattention. I’m unsure if a video has been released of the same compilation but itwon’t have anywhere near the clarity of picture definition of this DVD release.

If I had any complaints it would be that the compilation doesn’t include AlexanderMcQueen’s video for Alarm Call (No.33, Dec 98) but then that gives us somethingto look forward to when Volumen 2 will surely arrive in a few years time. Alsothere are no extras on the disc when a complete discography, available on the One LittleIndian website below, would be most welcome as the artwork on the singles and albums wouldmake a great picture gallery; and the packaging is one of the easily-breakable jewel caseswith no ‘push here’ facility to get the disc out making me think it might break if Iwasn’t careful.