Dave Mason-Live at the Sunrise Theater (2002)

This review is sponsored by

BUY IT

General		Extras
Category	Music	Main Menu Audio & Animation Scene Selection Anim & Audio Featurette-The Dave Mason Band-Behind The Scenes
Rating
Year Of Production	2002
Running Time	65:40
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Kevin Layne Brian Forti
Studio Distributor	Warner Vision	Starring	Dave Mason Richard Campbell John Sambataro Bobby Scumaci Greg Babcock
Case	Amaray-Transparent-Secure Clip
RPI	$34.95	Music	None Given

    Dave Mason's career spans over 30 years and includes all aspects of music, from song writing through producing to performing. At the ripe old age of 18, Dave found himself as a founding member of the group "Traffic" along with Steve Winwood, Jim Capaldi and Chris Wood.

    Traffic's second-to-be-released song was entitled "Hole In My Shoe" and was penned by Dave after a dream he had. The nature of the song lead many to speculate that the dream was drug induced. It eventually went on to reach #2 on the British Charts, selling over a million copies. This was hot on the heels of their first song, "Paper Sun", which made it to the #5 mark.

    Mason has also performed on a number of albums such as "Beggar's Banquet" (The Rolling Stones), "All Things Must Pass" (George Harrison), "Listen To What The Man Said" (Paul McCartney) and "Electric Ladyland" (Jimi Hendrix). In fact, on this particular DVD we find the song "All Along The Watchtower", which was written by Bob Dylan and is a track that Dave often performs live. He even mentions his respect for both Hendrix and Dylan on stage during the performance.

    Conversely, songs that Dave has written and performed are also re-released by other artists. The most notable would be "Feelin' Alright", which shot to fame at the hands of Joe Cocker around 1970. It was also around this time that Jim Gordon, Carl Radle and Bobby Whitlock formed Derek and the Dominos, asking Eric Clapton to front the band. Shortly thereafter, Dave was also asked to join the group. And let's not forget the time in 1993 when Dave joined another favourite band of mine, Fleetwood Mac. It was there that I first became aware of him.

    Over Dave Mason's career, he has played a part with, or been a major leader of, the biggest names in the industry. He continues to perform to this day and even if you have never heard his name before, rest assured that your foot has been tapping away happily to his tunes for years.

Video

    The transfer is presented in a full screen aspect ratio of 1.33:1, and is therefore not 16x9 enhanced.

    The transfer is clear and sharp with good definition visible on the faces and band instruments. Several close-ups of Dave at 10:35 and 21:07 show sweat and facial details with no image problems caused by the strong stage lighting. Shadow detail is also best noted for its high level of detail at these times and additionally at 3:20. This level of detail diminishes drastically in the almost complete darkness at the end of the feature as the band members exit through the stage curtains. Due to its timing, I would suggest that this is an intentional "fade out" rather than a problem specifically due to the transfer. The extras featurette has poor shadow detail, although its overall quality suggests that it was captured on a home video camera rather than on professional level equipment that can deliver higher levels of quality. There is no low level noise.

    As with most live performances, there are a lot of bright stage lights surrounded by complete darkness. To find the balance between these opposite ends of the lighting spectrum can be a daunting task. On this disc the problem is handled well, but the placement of some cameras could have been slightly adjusted to minimise the possibility of light flares being seen when a stage light directly hits the camera lens. Some instances of this are at 3:43, 7:55, 8:26 and 10:20. In fact, it occurred so often that I wondered if this was an intentional "effect" that the producer was looking for. Either way, there was too much of it and it detracted on occasion from the visual appeal of the lighting hitting the band. Applying a filter to soften these flares during post-production may have helped.

    There were very few MPEG artefacts to be seen. Aliasing is very rare and mild when it does occur at points such as 20:36 and 49:37. In fact, the former time cue is the only time I really noticed aliasing on the guitar, something which can be annoying on discs from other artists. Film artefacts were invisible, and the fact that the stage and surrounding area is dark may help to hide this particular artefact. The credits do not mention the type of camera or if film was used so I can only speculate on its original recording medium (film or videotape).

    Unfortunately, there are no subtitles present on this disc. You will have to go by memory if you want to sing along.

    This disc is single sided and single layered, and therefore there is no layer change.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    What can I say about the sound? Dave Mason personally mastered the audio track, so it must be exactly how Dave wanted his music to sound. Personally, I felt it was of high quality and this particular DVD will grace my DVD player often in the future.

    There are three audio tracks on this DVD. The default is an English Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack. There is also an English Dolby Digital 2.0 surround-encoded track and an English DTS 5.1 soundtrack. I listened to both the DTS and Dolby Digital 5.1 tracks in their entirety and the Dolby Digital 2.0 track only sporadically. The Dolby Digital 5.1 mix is several notches louder than the DTS track, which is the opposite of what you would normally expect. As for the differences between the two, I found the Dolby Digital 5.1 track to sound as if there was more treble, but otherwise it was a fine recording. The DTS track has a stronger and more powerful sound, especially the spread between the front soundstage and the rear, giving this track more "presence" and depth.

    The dialogue was clear and easy to understand at all times. Audio sync was not a problem at all with this transfer, and was completely spot on.

    The soundtrack is even better than the image and was a real pleasure to listen to. The sound is wide and expansive and the tracks maintain this regardless of the volume you pump through the system. For example, I played the song Feelin' Alright with my receiver set to -10dB for all soundtracks and the DTS track was the clear winner, maintaining an almost magical clarity and presence in the room. The surrounds were not as aggressive as I would have liked but there was nice use of split surrounds and near-transparent imaging across all the channels. All instruments maintained a fixed position in the soundstage so that you could shut your eyes and imagine where the musicians were, although this aural placement does not actually match their physical placement on the stage, so a fair bit of post production work must have been done to alter the soundfield so much. The only exception to this was the drums. When the drums had a small solo or required a stronger presence, they were mixed to move around the room in a random fashion. At first, I found this distracting but then my ears just let it happen and it seemed to work with the rest of the instruments. It is most noticeable at around 14:36.

    The subwoofer was active during a lot of the songs and put a nice bottom end onto the sound. The song 40,000 Headmen was where this particular speaker really made its presence felt on this disc.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

Menu

Behind The Scenes (15:30)

    The Region 4 version of this disc misses out on;

• Nothing

• Nothing

    It was good to see Dave live again and jammin' out some of his tunes.

    The video quality is good.

    The audio quality is superb and the inclusion of all 3 soundtracks will cater for all tastes and equipment configurations.

    The extras are merely satisfactory, but the main concert feature will be something that fans of all ages will enjoy.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall