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Category:    Home > Reviews > Concert > Rock > Pop > Alternative > Counterculture > Comedy > TV Special > Claymation > Stop Motion Anima > Garbage: one mile high…live (2012/Eagle Blu-ray)/Frank Zappa: A Token Of His Extreme (1974/Eagle DVD)

Garbage: one mile high…live (2012/Eagle Blu-ray)/Frank Zappa: A Token Of His Extreme (1974/Eagle DVD)

 

Picture: B-/C+     Sound: B-/C+     Extras: B-/C+     Main Programs: B-

 

 

Now for two major music acts that challenged the conventions of pop music and became critical favorites and found serious fan bases…

 

 

Garbage: one mile high…live (2012) features a recent concert by the enduring band who gave us hits like I’m Only Happy When It Rains, Special, Queer and of course, Stupid Girl.  In this Detroit show, they play those and more (20 altogether) in a show that proves they are as strong as ever.  I just wish this ran more than 90 minutes.

 

Lead singer Shirley Manson still has one of the best voices in music, Pop, Rock & otherwise, while Drummer/Genius Butch Vig, Steve Marker, Duke Ericson (both on Guitars and Keyboards) and Eric Avery (guest Bassist from Nine Inch Nails) deliver the sound and feel of the music the band has been known for at almost 20 years and counting.  They had made some great albums and had some big, important hits (some of the best of the time) when they recorded the title song for the lame James Bond film The World Is Not Enough, which was written by Don Black (who wrote the classic Diamonds Are Forever and wacky Man With The Golden Gun for the series among his movie theme songs) and it just did not work.  This derailed their commercial path, but they still have it in them and I hope for a new album soon.

 

Extras include an illustrated paper pullout with brief text, while the Blu-ray adds two Music Videos and six featurette clips including a warm-up and five on songs from the show.  You can read more about them in our coverage of their great Music Videos collection Absolute Garbage at this link:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/6438/Absolute+Garbage+(Music+Videos/DVD

 

 

Then we have Frank Zappa: A Token Of His Extreme, a 1974 self-funded TV concert special that was never accepted by any network or syndicator and never aired in the U.S., though it did well overseas and was funded by Zappa himself.  Like Garbage, he was fighting standard Pop forms, but some of these can hardly be called songs and instead come from a counterculture sense of humor and spoken comedy not unlike the Firesign Theater, like the track Stink-Foot.  The idea in Zappa’s work is to be organic to the point of absurdity and possibly grossness, depending on how you take things.

 

The show includes then-odd video editing and some Claymation & Stop-Motion Animation by Bruce Bickford, who did the same remarkable work five years later on Zappa’s feature film Baby Snakes (1979, see link below) issued on DVD a few years ago (Blu-ray please?) adding up to something interesting, innovative and original from a great year for international television.  Saturday Night Live had not started yet, or this could have been shown at 1 AM EST after a show or maybe added to a late broadcast of SCTV as late.  It was cutting edge and even if it is odd, including ironic reference to older ways of band’s performing (Zappa and his African American bandmates from Mothers Of Invention (who would fold by the next year) mocking, referencing potentially racial Big Band Jazz-era moments) makes for an interesting program that is not just wallowing in cynicism.

 

Many have criticized Zappa’s visual work as nonsense that is meant to be head-trip material for drug-users, but more is always going on in his visual projects than he and his band get credit for, so now that the world of visual media has somewhat caught up with im, those watching this will get more out of it.

This is the ninth Zappa title we have covered and there are sure to be more.  You can read about them and more to come at this link:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/new/viewer.cgi?search=ZAPPA

 

Extras include a nicely illustrated paper pullout on the show with some brief informative text that spoofs the old TV Guide Magazine covers, while the DVD adds a “Yes, And But Also” section with a great clip of Zappa joining Kenny Rogers (as he was starting up his big solo success) and Jimmy Walker (at his Good Times peak) on The Mike Douglas Show in 1976 still trying to sell the show, text Discography, text DVDography and FZ Note form the booklet that quotes the Douglas Show appearance.

 

 

The 1080i 1.78 X 1 digital High Definition image on Garbage looks pretty good for such a recent taping with interesting color throughout and though it can be dark, have some detail and depth issues at times, I liked the look defying the generic look too many HD-shot concerts have.  The 1.33 X 1 image on Zappa is from old reel-to-reel NTSC analog videotape which is colorful, includes the animation and is softer, of course, but is a pretty good transfer of what is there and plays back nicely.

 

The DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 5.1 lossless mix on Garbage is a little bit disappointing, sounding compressed and oddly mixed, so I actually enjoyed the PCM 96/24 2.0 Stereo track more which has more transparency.  The PCM 2.0 Stereo track on Zappa shows its age a bit more and still sounds good for its age, but has its sonic limits.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo


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