Angie Stone-Live in Vancouver Island (Music in High Places) (2002)

This review is sponsored by

BUY IT

General		Extras
Category	Music	Featurette-Behind The Scenes-9 Music Highlights-Just The Music - 8 songs Biographies-Cast-Angie Stone
Rating
Year Of Production	2002
Running Time	53:43
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Ryan Polito
Studio Distributor	Warner Vision	Starring	Angie Stone Kenny Seymour Larry Peoples Sr Larry Peoples Jr Christopher Morgan Kemba Francis Tehnita Dreher
Case	Amaray-Transparent-Secure Clip
RPI	$34.95	Music	Angie Stone

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) English Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s) English dts 5.1 (768Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.75:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.75:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	French German Spanish	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    The idea behind Music In High Places is to take a musician/recording artist to an exotic/remote location, get them to talk to the locals, ogle at various sights, perform some of their best known songs "on location" and package it all up as a travelogue or travel documentary cum music videos/live performances.

    This "episode" features soul/gospel singer/songwriter Angie Stone together with her band visiting Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. Her first album, Black Diamond, went platinum and her second album, Mahogany Soul, was also well received.

    For this programme, Angie is accompanied by a band of musicians including:

• Kenny Seymour (music director/accordion)
• Larry Peoples, Sr. (bass)
• Larry Peoples, Jr. (drums)
• Christopher Morgan (guitar)
• Kemba Francis (background vocals)
• Tehnita Dreher (background vocals)

    The programme takes us to various spots on Vancouver Island, including the magnificent Capilano Suspension Bridge, Cathedral Grove, Herbert Inlet, and Big Beach, Ucluelet. In addition, we encounter various native tribes, including the Capilano Tribe and the Ucluelet Tribe. It was interesting that the various tribes have distinctly (at least to me) Asiatic/Oriental features - perhaps the theory that parts of North America were "discovered" by ancient Chinese seafarers and settled by them may be true after all.

    The programme is struggling to fill an hour of running time, and after about 40 minutes reverts to behind the scenes footage that really should belong in a separate featurette.

Video

    This is a recent Music In High Places DVD featuring a 16x9 enhanced widescreen transfer in an aspect ratio of approximately 1.73:1. (Early discs in the series that I reviewed were not 16x9 enhanced). We also have a new director (Ryan Polito) rather than Alan Carter.

    Like most of the other titles in the series, the transfer is somewhat on the soft side, with occasional over-exposed cinematography.

    My main issue with this transfer is the slightly jerky pans. I suspect the original video source is in NTSC, and the resultant conversion from 59.94 Hz to PAL's 50 Hz has resulted in the jerky motion.

    Other than that, I did not really notice any other artefacts, probably because the length of the feature is so short and it's on a dual layered disc.

    There are four subtitle tracks on the disc, but one of them is a silent one. The remaining three are French, German, and Spanish. I turned them on briefly just to check that they do exist.

    This is a single sided dual layered disc (RSDL). The main feature is entirely contained on Layer 0 and the extras on Layer 1 so there is no layer change.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    There are three audio tracks on this disc: English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s), English Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s), and English dts 5.1 (768Kb/s). I must admit that I was surprised to discover the presence of a dts track, and this is certainly the first time I have encountered a dts audio track on a Music In High Places title.

    None of the three tracks are what I would consider reference quality. They all sound slightly muffled.

    Both the Dolby Digital 5.1 and 2.0 tracks are comparable in quality. The dts track sounds slightly duller than the first two, but makes up for it by sounding slightly more spacious with greater ambience recovery.

    The centre and rear channels on the multi-channel tracks are used to convey subtle ambience and environmental background noises. The LFE track is mainly used to reinforce the low frequencies in the track.

    I did not notice any issues with dialogue intelligibility or audio synchronization.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Menu

    The menus are full frame and static.

Featurette-Behind The Scenes-9

    This is a set of short featurettes that appear to be off-cuts from the main feature:

• Into The Woods (4:10) - this seems to be behind the scenes footage of the cast and crew setting up in the woods
• Whale Watching (1:21) - cast and crew gets onto a glass bottomed boat to do some whale watching
• Angie Goes Accordion (3:41) - Angie tries playing the accordion
• Bear Witch (1:42) - three band members go on a bushwalk and do a parody of The Blair Witch Project
• Ninja Accordion Player (0:42) - Kenny Seymour (the accordion player) goes feral
• Forest Skake (0:53) - more hi-jinks and fooling around from three of the band members
• Ferry Boat (2:56) - cast and crew get onto the ferry boat to take them to Vancouver Island
• Hula Mama (1:24) - the crew introduces the figurine of a jiggling island girl with a guitar
• Bridge Over Chilly Waters (1:32) - the cast walks along the wooden suspension bridge

    All featurettes are presented in 1.73:1 letterboxed (no 16x9 enhancement) and Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s). There are actually three audio tracks, but they all appear to be identical (English). In addition, there are French, German and Spanish subtitle tracks.

Music Videos - Just The Music

    These are separate music videos of the following songs:

• Bottles & Cans (4:04)
• Brotha (3:41)
• Easier Said Than Done (3:28)
• Holding Back The Years (2:49)
• Love & Happiness (4:43)
• P***** Off (3:59)
• Sailing (3:03)
• Wish I Didn't Miss You (4:22)

    The music videos are presented in 1.73:1 letterboxed (not 16x9 enhanced) and with three audio tracks: Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s), Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s), and dts 5.1 (768Kb/s). The Dolby Digital 2.0 track seems to be slightly better sounding than the Dolby Digital 5.1 audio track. Unfortunately, the dts track is not well mastered, for it is not synced to the video and is mastered at a very low level.

Biographies - Cast - Angie Stone

    This is a set of six stills containing a brief biography of Angie Stone.

    The disc appears to be identical across Region 1 and 4, with the possible exception of subtitle tracks.

    Angie Stone - Live in Vancouver Island is part of the Music in High Places travel/music series and features soul singer Angie Stone with her band singing in and exploring various locations on Vancouver Island.

    The video quality is mediocre but 16x9 enhanced.

    The audio tracks are below average.

    Extras include a number of featurettes and music videos.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall