Earth, Wind & Fire-Live (1994)

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General		Extras
Category	Music	Menu Animation & Audio Interviews-Cast-4 Multiple Angles Easter Egg
Rating
Year Of Production	1994
Running Time	60:07
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (30:06)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Allen Plone
Studio Distributor	Warner Vision	Starring	Wind & Fire Earth
Case	Click
RPI	$34.95	Music	Wind & Fire Earth

    After decades of fantastic music and passionate performances, Earth, Wind & Fire showcase their remarkable talents as a complete group one last time. Recorded live in Japan in 1994, this DVD features charismatic front man Maurice White in his last taped performance with the group. Sadly, Maurice White has recently been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease.

    At the start of this concert, you soon discover that, even though years have passed and everyone's a little older, the band members have lost none of their vibrant spark. With some older bands (and even a few currently popular ones), we can sometimes get the idea that they may have run their race and just don't have anything left. I'm happy to say that there are no such limp performances here! With their  unique blend of soul, urban, gospel and disco, they bring each style into one cohesive mix and make it all their own. From their mid-tempo opening number September (it's nice to hear the name September in an upbeat context after the events of 9-11) to the dance-invoking disco era hit Boogie Wonderland to the bittersweet harmonies of After The Love Is Gone, this is a fine package to highlight the band's career. Almost all of their major hits are on offer here in what is a deceptively short time of 60 minutes, as the DVD seems to run for much longer.

    Other highlights are Philip Bailey fronting the band for their song Fantasy (which was made into a world-wide superhit in 1990 by Black Box), Maurice White performing on the seldom seen kalimba during Kalimba Interlude, and Philip Bailey vs The Sax in Reasons (which is something few vocalists, especially male, can do). Bassist Verdine White is amazing to watch with his exuberant on-stage antics. An absolute wild man in this concert, one can only imagine what he was like in his heyday!

    While some of the camera work on display here looks a bit amateurish (there are quite a few whip pans, zoom errors and focus problems), we are presented with a lively, energetic and fun-filled hour with one of the leading soul bands of the 70s and 80s, although the term soul might be either misleading or incomplete, as the band covers so much territory in their musical repertoire. They had their own sound that they created and can only be described as: Earth, Wind & Fire!

Video

    The transfer is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio of 1.33:1 and as such, there is no 16x9 enhancement.

    The sharpness of the image is near perfect with the only problems being the limitations of the original videotape medium. Still, the image is at most times very clear and clean. There are some focus issues from time to time, but these seem to be related to the camera work and not any problems with the transfer or disc. Shadow detail is fine with black levels being well defined throughout, despite the fact that there is so much lighting on the subjects. There are a few crowd shots during the feature that display little shadow detail and poor image quality, but this can be attributed to the lack of lighting and the limitations of the videotape medium. There is no low level noise to be seen during this feature.

    There is much bright colour featured during this program with all of it seeming to be displayed quite accurately. Maurice White's bright red suit stands out as one of the most prominent colours, but the band's costumes and the stage lights also feature. At all times, the colour is natural and clear of chroma noise.

    MPEG artefacts are thankfully nowhere to be seen during this feature, and for the most part there is little in the way of video artefacts at all. There is one small glitch at 15:23 which looks to be a tracking error at the bottom of the image. It seems to have originated from the original source tape and does not distract very much as it is on screen for less than a second. There are several portions of the program that have the appearance of film with some grain being visible - some of these portions are in black and white. This seems to be a post-processing effect that has been applied by the producers and as such is not really a transfer artefact.

    There are no subtitles on this DVD.

    This is an RSDL disc with the layer change placed at 30:06 which is within Chapter 11 at the end of the song Shining Star. It is at a point where the screen has almost faded to black and while visible, it is not overly distracting.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    There are 2 audio tracks available on this disc, these being Dolby Digital 5.1 and Dolby Digital 2.0 surround-encoded.

    Dialogue, or perhaps more accurately, vocal quality is absolutely spot-on throughout this feature and is always clean and understandable within the context of the song.

    Audio sync was not a issue during this program and was always perfect.

    Of course, the music is by Earth, Wind & Fire and is in a soul, funk, urban, disco, gospel and R&B style that at times defies description.

    The surround channels have been used to convey the atmosphere of the live concert. As such, they do not direct attention to themselves and act in their proper supporting role.

    Although this feature's audio tends to be fairly bright and treble-oriented, the subwoofer does reinforce the bass notes of the performers. It never attracts undue attention to itself and blends with the sound from the other 5 channels.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

Menu

• Start Program
• Audio Selection
• Song Index
• Band Interviews

    The Audio Selection offers you the choice of Dolby Digital 5.1 and Dolby Digital 2.0. This menu is silent and there is no 16x9 enhancement.

Song Index

Band Interviews

Mulit-Angle Sequences

Easter Egg

Summary

    The video quality is first rate with a very clean transfer to DVD.

    The audio is a good live performance with a workable though bright and treble-oriented Dolby Digital 5.1 mix.

    The extras are adequate, though not over abundant. The Easter Egg is a nice surprise.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall