The Jeff Healey Band – Live At Montreux 1999 (DVD/CD Set)
Picture:
C+ Sound: B- Extras: C Concert: B-
The Jeff
Healey Band has a few hits and some notice in 1989/1990, but have not been
heard from much since. At their peak,
they toured heavily and this new DVD/CD set The Jeff Healey Band – Live At Montreux 1999 captures them in the
thick of their peak, for better and worse.
Healey has been blind since age one and actually starting picking up the
guitar at age three. Angel Eyes was their big hit around the
time of their appearance in the Patrick Swayze mess Road House (1989, which inexplicably just had a straight-to-video
sequel in 2006 for no good reason), which did a tiny bit of business at the
time.
Though he
is talented and the concert is not bad, the trip up here is on the cover
songs. The Stealer’s Wheel classic Stuck In The Middle With You, about
record executives and now associated with Quentin Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs, is even by his own
admission sort of experimental.
Unfortunately, that does not stop Hoochie
Coochie Man and especially George Harrison’s While My Guitar Gently Weeps from really not living up to their own
material. However, it is a good
compilation fans and the curious will get enough enjoyment out of to check out
if interested.
The image
variants here are odd. Both captured on
video, the main concert from 1999 is 1.33 x 1 while the 1997 bonus tracks are
letterboxed 1.78 X 1. Both look about as
good as each other, though the ’97 bonus clips are a tad cleaner. Color is not bad, but obvious detail limits
can be found in both. Sound is a
different matter.
The sound
here in Dolby Digital 5.1, PCM 2.0 16bit/48kHz Stereo and DTS 5.1 are not bad,
though the DTS is once again the superior playback choice. However, where all sound a bit compressed and
limited in the 1999 main concert, the 1997 concert is cleaner and clearer. This is not as obvious on the bonus CD with
its PCM 2.0 16bit/44.1kHz Stereo, which is all the 1999 concert except for two
1997 tracks. The only extras are those
tracks and a paper pullout in the DVD case with an essay about the band and
concert.
- Nicholas Sheffo
