Nicks, Stevie-Live at Red Rocks (Warner Vision) (1987)

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General		Extras
Category	Music	Main Menu Introduction Main Menu Audio & Animation Biographies-Cast Discography
Rating
Year Of Production	1987
Running Time	55:00 (Case: 57)
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	1,2,3,4,5,6	Directed By	Marty Callner
Studio Distributor	Warner Vision	Starring	Stevie Nicks Waddy Wachtel Jai Winding Robert Martin Jennifer Condos Rick Marotta Bobbye Hall Lori Petty Sharon Celani Elisecia Wright
Case	Amaray-Transparent
RPI	$39.95	Music	Stevie Nicks

    There is perhaps no more unique concert venue than Red Rocks, Colorado, and many an act has performed at the venue. It is therefore something of a rare treat to not only see a concert at this unique venue, but to see Stevie Nicks perform. Unfortunately, what this concert video proves is that a unique venue and a big name do not necessarily make for a great piece of entertainment. To be honest, this is not a great example of the art of either DVD or concert videos.

    It does not help that the video was recorded fourteen years ago and that certain, apparently artistic meddlings have been made that detract somewhat from the show. Nor does it help that on stage, Stevie Nicks is not the most dynamic of performers and spends some time looking directly into the camera. Still, this does give a glimpse of some of the highlights of the lady's earlier work.

    At a rather short length and a premium price, I have to say that this is not a DVD to rush out for, even if you are a serious fan of the lady.

Video

    The transfer is presented in a Full Frame format, and it is not 16x9 enhanced.

    The entire transfer really smacks of average throughout. A mediocre transfer in the sharpness department, which I admit is not aided by the artistic choices, the whole thing lacks a degree of detail that I find disappointing. Shadow detail is nothing to write home about, and clarity similarly is hardly in the exemplary league. Indeed, at times the source material is relatively grainy and this cannot be rectified by any amount of magnificence in the mastering department. There did not appear to be any low level noise problems in the transfer.

    The transfer is a bit all over the place as far as colour goes, partly the result of the artistic choices and partly the result of the concert lighting. It is never anything approaching a decent, believable palette of colours and varies from undersaturation to oversaturation. Suffice it to say, there is nothing approaching vibrancy in this transfer. The oversaturation is the result of the red lighting at times but is only to the slight end of the scale and is nothing especially distracting. There is no colour bleed that distracts in this transfer.

    There did not appear to be any MPEG artefacts in the transfer. There did not appear to be any film-to-video artefacts in the transfer. There did not appear to be any significant film artefacts in the transfer.

    The are no subtitle options on the DVD, which is a further impediment to the possibility of recommending the DVD.

    Another impediment of the DVD is the fact that the disc is not encoded with any time information and displays the completely unhelpful message PLAY during the entire playback of the DVD. I don't know if it is just me, but I find this really annoying.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    There is just the one soundtrack on the DVD, being an English Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack.

    The vocals come up reasonably clearly and easy to understand in the transfer. There did not seem to be any audio sync problems in the transfer.

    Despite the slightly higher than usual bitrate of the soundtrack, there is nothing really special about the soundtrack at all. There are a couple of minor dropouts here and there that I would presume are inherent in the source material, but apart from that there is nothing much wrong here. Unfortunately there is nothing really right about the soundtrack either, and the lack of any serious surround presence is a distinct downer. One of the joys of Red Rocks as a venue is apparently the great acoustic that it has. You would not know it from this recording.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    Another sadly disappointing component of what is ultimately a sadly disappointing DVD.

Menu

    Featuring a lengthy menu introduction that shows some of the behind the scenes stuff, they are otherwise notable for some decent audio and animation enhancement. In themselves, about the best bit of the whole DVD.

Biography - Cast

    Whilst reasonably brief, it nonetheless provides a decent overview of Stevie Nicks' career whilst pulling not too many punches over her drug addiction.

Discography

    Merely a one page listing of the lady's albums.

    As far as we can ascertain, this DVD is identical to that available in Region 1.

    Stevie Nicks - Rock A Little: Live At Red Rocks is a very disappointing and unsatisfying DVD in just about every possible way. The video transfer is nothing special at all, the audio transfer is also decidedly average and the extras package underwhelming. Add to the mix a paucity of length and you have a DVD that really is unrecommendable at the asking price. Premium pricing demands premium product - this is anything but premium product. This is basically a cheap rehash of the Very Hazy System tape.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall