Marty Balin - Live At The Boston Esplanade, June 14, 2008 (2009)
Marty Balin (Actor), n (Director), a (Director) | Rated: NR | Format: DVD
3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
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Now let's look at some of those reviews to Mr Viglione's great movie (excluding the planted reviews from Joe Viglione's friends & aliases)
The problem is the way the outdoor show was shot, December 28, 2009
By Gregory Starr - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Marty Balin - Live At The Boston Esplanade, June 14, 2008 (DVD)
Balin deserves so much more than what the producer of this dvd gives. The lack of production gets in the way of the concert recording.
The producer and his note writer use Amazon Customer Review to hustle their own production and rate it at five stars. From a customer's viewpoint, these "rock journalists" are wannabe producers who know nothing about sound and vision technology. And seem unwilling to invest in it. Their camera crew seems to be making a home movie: jitters, jumps, bleached out colour, no close-ups, and a sound that is not very good. Is 5.1 too much to expect on a dvd? Can't Balin connect with better producers, maybe experienced producers?
But to be fair the problem is deeper. Balin's band cannot rouse the crowd, which seems pretty indifferent and sleepy in the midday sun. This is because the band is doing just a routine run-through of 8 hits; any potential customer has probably heard these played better many times. If you haven't, check youtube. It was a mistake to record an afternoon show. The one new song, "If I had a rocket launcher", seems extraordinarily inappropriate in these terrorist-conscious times. Didi Stewart impersonates Grace Slick, which of course cannot succeed. Stewart should consider Slick's advice about older women performing onstage. Sorry if politically incorrect. The band's performances do not engage and are not memorable. Take a look at youtube, where you can judge her and the band's performances for yourself. I find that youtube performances from other concert venues on the same tour, especially Wisconsin, would have made a far, far better dvd.
I would have liked to recommend this product, but the production sucks and the concert is boring and lackluster.
Balin really needs to consider what he has to offer as a solo artist, how to make his concerts interesting and to whom he is going to entrust his productions. If he is just going to rehash the hits, maybe he does not have to bother.
Big problems come in the bonus features. How about the word "slapdash"? A book writer gets time to plug his own book. When the bonuses finally get around to Mr Balin, "Later on" is promised, but it turns out to be wordless...lalala, lala... In a couple, Balin is visually unrecognizable. In another, the camera is unmanned, and bystanders walk in front and dawdle. The producer seems to think that a fan will accept any kind of quality. However, I think he will learn that fans expect good quality dvd productions. But in these bonuses, Balin gives some intimate and engaging performances. You just have to overlook the production.
Balin is a great writer and performer. Production detracts lots from these. If you only have this dvd, then you would not know why anyone liked Mr Balin's work. Maybe someone else will do a decent production of Mr Balin's music.
Great content, poor production, December 30, 2009
By J. Pedrick "Joe P." (Yardley, PA United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Marty Balin - Live At The Boston Esplanade, June 14, 2008 (DVD)
I was struck by the poor video and audio quality of this dvd, at least to the point of writing here which I've never done before. I understand the continual reference to this being a "labior of love" but frankly, it should have had more labor put into it. Content=great (five stars), production=terrible (no stars).
Amateur Video Production, April 24, 2011
By Masorl - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Marty Balin - Live At The Boston Esplanade, June 14, 2008 (DVD)
I agree with previous reviewers' comments regarding the poor production quality of this video. I am a Jefferson Airplane and Jefferson Starship fan and have seen Marty Balin perform a number of times. Due to the poor quality of this release, it is not representative of a Marty Balin concert. It seemed like only one of the cameras (camcorders?) used was in focus, others blurred through most of the performance and the camera shake, at times, grew to be unbearable. If I had known this was an amateur production, I would not have purchased this DVD. I am now stuck with a DVD I will probably not watch again.
Did I watch a different DVD than you 5-star reviewers?, May 16, 2012
By H. P. Keable "more bass!" (Chicago, IL) - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Marty Balin - Live At The Boston Esplanade, June 14, 2008 (DVD)
Make no mistake, I wanted to like this DVD a lot, but there's no getting around the fact that at 65+ y.o. Marty's voice is pretty much shot, at least in a live setting. Yeah sure, the video production is amateur all the way, but if he had sounded halfway decent in the Boston show, I could have overlooked all that. He did not. I've heard other examples of this on the Mick's Picks live CD set from 2007. You find yourself being embarassed for the guy cuz he was one of the great ones. And yet his studio CD's from the past decade are pretty good.....go figure.
There are some bonus tracks from other places, and two of them, Fitzgerald's 2006 and Madison, WI, 2007, are just him and Slick Aguilar, and they're not bad. He doesn't reach for the moon vocally. Plus in Madison he sings a version of "Somebody to Love" which was worth getting the DVD just for that, very nice.
Well with glowering testimonials like those above dear readers, what can I possibly add to the critique's of Joe Viglione's former customers other than
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