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Dom Robinson reviews
Classic Pictures
- Cert:
- Cat.no: DVD 7065X
- Running time: 190 minutes
- Year: 2003
- Pressing: 2003
- Region(s): 2, PAL
- Chapters: 36 plus extras
- Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1, DTS 5.1
- Languages: English
- Subtitles: 4 non-English
- Widescreen: 1.78:1
- 16:9-Enhanced: Yes
- Macrovision: Yes
- Disc Format: 2 * DVD 9
- Price: £19.99
- Extras : 127-minute Live Audio Set
Writer/Director:
- Robert Garofalo
Producer:
- Lyn Beardsall
Narrated by:
- Roger Daltrey
Musicians:
- Jon Anderson, Steve Howe, Chris Squire, Alan White & Rick Wakeman
YesSpeaktraces the band roots back to London, 1968, when vocalist Jon Anderson met upwith bass guitarist Chris Squire as the former worked in a bar and the latterwas performing at the Marquee Club with his band, “Mabel Greer’s Toy Shop”.Anderson joined along with the other band members Peter Banks and Tony Kayeand they had to decide on better songs and a much more memorable name. Theprog-rock gods were born…
Each of the 10 sections in this documentary run for 15-20 minutes andthe first is entitled, Sacred Ground, highlighting where eachof the band members like to chill out when not performing together. JonAnderson is interviewed in his California home, Chris Squire isseen on holiday in Ibiza with his family, Steve Howe remains true to the UKin his Devon home, later detailing why he likes to ensure his Gibson E175 guitarhas a plane seat all to itself, Alan White fell in love with Lake Washington, Seattleearly on in his career and comments on his glass drumkit in a nearby musicmuseum; and finally Rick Wakeman, who embarked on a 40-date solo tourbetween the US and Europe, and was interviewed in Tenerife. He jokes about hisvarious illness during his life such as heart attacks, plurisy and wonders howmany other parts are left to drop off him, and how many of his nine lives hehas left.
Full Circle charts the band’s beginnings and skims through variousaspects of how they got things together, while There’s Always Been A Yescharts their frequent membership changes and that however people come and gofrom the line-up, nothing will stop the band from performing one way or another.Following the individual Spotlight on… sections, On the Roadtakes a brief look at how things go when they’re setting up for a gig andwhere they went on the tour, while Yes Music concludes with more ofthe same about Yes and their music, right up until the tour’s end.
The band on stage.
While two of my ‘Yes’ friends, Kev Fletcher and Gary Thorogoodare au fait with the 70s era of the band, I first came across them in 1983with their ‘90215’ output such as “Owner of a Lonely Heart” and “LeaveIt”, mostly later playing a tape of 1987’s Big Generator albumuntil it could nearly play no more (that’s a lie, the tape’s fine :),going to see the 1991 Union tour with Kev at the Birmingham NEC, wherethey had a rotating stage, and now everything’s brought up to date with this2-disc boxset.
YesSpeak is lengthy at just over 3 hours long, but it’s still succinctenough to be intriguing for anyone wanting to get to know the necessaryinfo about the band and, essentially, it’s very accessible for them to get intowhile still being of great interest for their hardcore fanbase. However, RogerDaltrey’s OTT narration can get a bit grating at times.
What would’ve been ideal, since we get to see clips from their tour, is tohave included a disc or two extra of the full concert. You’ll get to hearexcerpts of the songs during YesSpeak, but that would have been the icing onthe cake.
The 2003 ‘best of’ compilation,
the underrated Big Generator album and 1991’s Union collaboration.
The documentary is presented in 16:9 anamorphic widescreen and looks greatmost of the time, particularly in the recent live footage, but interview clipscan look less spectacular having been shot on a camcorder it appears, sometimesin too much close-up. Also, during the first section only, the picture hasbeen shoved slightly too much to the left and for those with a lack of overscanon their TV, they’ll see the very right-hand edge of the image that’s not meantto be seen and it’s very obvious.
Sound is available in both Dolby Digital 5.1 and DTS 5.1, the latter beingmy preference, but while there’s no question that the live footage pieces arenote-perfect, there’s too much volume from them during certain interview clipsas they drown out the speech completely. I ended up putting the French subtitleson, as I have a basic understanding of that, and it helped to work out whatwas being said.
It would be wrong to define the singular extra as the only piece of supplementarymaterial since it’s not that kind of DVD. It’s a compliment to all of what you’veseen already. It’s a 127-minute Live Audio Set taken from the 35thanniversary gigs along with stills. The combination of music and stills makefor a low bitrate that enables them to fit onto the disc, and also makes up toa degree for there not being a separate disc of the concert itself.
The cover also mentions a free YesSpeak poster, but on opening up you find youneed to visitYesPosters.comand even that site doesn’t work at the time of writing this review.
The menus blend in well with the theme of the disc, with subtle music playingAnd You And I at first, before settling on a static logo in silence.There are subtitles in French, German, Italian and Spanish. Erm… why not inEnglish?! They would’ve been a help at the start where the opening music drownsout the speech!Only ten chapters though, as previously mentioned. Would’ve been nice to splitthese up too given their length.
PICTURE QUALITY
SOUND QUALITY
EXTRAS
OVERALL
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.